Fast, compliant background checks for staffing and recruitment

You almost always do, because the duty binds any person who procures a report or causes one to be procured. The detail worth reading twice is the closing words of the provision: the consumer must authorize procurement by that person. An authorization naming only your agency does not, on its face, authorize your client to procure. If your client also directs the order, the client needs to be named. (15 U.S.C. 1681b(b)(2)(A))

There is no agency guidance either way on whether a combined agency and client disclosure satisfies the standalone document rule, so treat it as unsettled and take advice on your own form rather than on a template. We will tell you what we see across other agencies; we will not tell you your form is compliant. (15 U.S.C. 1681b(b)(2)(A)(ii))

Your client. The duty binds the person intending to take the adverse action, and that is whoever is declining. You can deliver the notice for them, and we can deliver it for you, and neither of those moves the liability. Tell them the part they will not have read: there is a reasonable-procedures defense for the adverse action notice and no equivalent defense for the pre-adverse notice, so a client who delegates it and relies on it has no statutory protection if it does not go out. (15 U.S.C. 1681b(b)(3)(A); 15 U.S.C. 1681m(c))

Then the notices are yours. A denial of employment, or any other decision for employment purposes that adversely affects a prospective employee, is adverse action. Where you decline and your client also declines, two decisions can mean two sets of notices. (15 U.S.C. 1681a(k)(1)(B)(ii); 15 U.S.C. 1681b(b)(3); 15 U.S.C. 1681m(a))

No. The report goes to the consumer unredacted, and you may not strip it back before sending it. (15 U.S.C. 1681b(b)(3)(A)(i))

There is no FTC opinion squarely on the staffing handoff, so anyone who gives you a flat yes or no is guessing. What is on the record is the FTC’s position that an agent or employee that obtains consumer reports does not become a consumer reporting agency by sharing those reports with its principal or employer in connection with the purposes for which the reports were initially obtained. The safe structure follows from that: order as your client’s designated agent, in writing, for that client’s own employment decision, and return the report to that client for the same purpose. Two practices point the other way, because the definition turns on assembling and evaluating: keeping a database of past reports and re-supplying their content to later clients, and adjudicating a candidate against a client’s criteria and then reporting the conclusion. If you want a firmer answer than that, it needs counsel rather than more research. (15 U.S.C. 1681a(f); FTC, Forty Years of Experience with the Fair Credit Reporting Act, comment 603(f)-4H)

Only for what it does cover, which is much less than the industry assumes. The exclusion reaches communications that would otherwise be an investigative consumer report, meaning character information gathered from personal interviews. It does not cover a criminal record, a motor vehicle record, a credit report, or an education or employment verification. Any agency relying on it for record-based screening is relying on the wrong provision. (15 U.S.C. 1681a(o); 15 U.S.C. 1681a(e))

There is no federal shelf life on a report; nothing in the FCRA expires one. What constrains reuse sits upstream: the authorization has to cover this procurement by this person, and the certification given to the consumer reporting agency is per report. So re-authorize and re-run per placement rather than relying on a file copy. (15 U.S.C. 1681b(b)(1)(A), (b)(2)(A)(ii))

Seven years for arrests, civil suits and judgments. Convictions carry no federal time limit. None of those caps apply to a job paying $75,000 or more. State law frequently goes further than the federal floor, so check where the placement sits. (15 U.S.C. 1681c(a), (b)(3))

You do. The regulation defines the employer of contract labor as the contractor rather than the person or entity using the contract labor, so whoever pays the worker owes the I-9. Separately, where you place workers into a pool to be referred, verify employment authorization the same way for everyone: selective verification is itself a violation, and knowledge may not be inferred from appearance or accent. (8 CFR 274a.1(g); 8 U.S.C. 1324b; 8 CFR 274a.1(l)(2))

That depends entirely on which regime is asking, and using the phrase without naming the regime is the most common error in staffing compliance material. OSHA treats the agency and the host as joint employers as a matter of course. The National Labor Relations Board test is far narrower: the entity must possess and exercise substantial direct and immediate control over an essential term, and a client that sets minimal hiring standards such as those required by government regulation is not, on the face of the rule, a joint employer for that reason. The EEOC applies its own right to control test. (29 CFR 103.40(a), (c)(4); EEOC Notice No. 915.002, 3 December 1997)

No. The EEOC’s position is that where a staffing firm’s discriminatory assignment practice is based on its client’s requirement, that is no defense, and both can be liable as joint employers. Where both of you are employers under the EEO laws, you are jointly and severally liable for back pay, front pay and compensatory damages. Which is the practical argument for setting the package by role and applying it the same way every time. (EEOC Notice No. 915.002, 3 December 1997)

Not unless you are agricultural. That duty is limited to an agricultural association, an agricultural employer or a farm labor contractor. What does reach every recruiter and referrer, in every industry, is the knowing hire prohibition, and knowing includes knowledge that may fairly be inferred from the circumstances. (8 CFR 274a.2(a)(1); 8 U.S.C. 1324a(a)(1)(A); 8 CFR 274a.1(l)(1))

Up to a point, and the conditions matter. A provider may reduce or eliminate its civil monetary penalty exposure by relying on your exclusion screening, but only where you agreed to it by contract and the provider can show it exercised due diligence in checking that you were doing it. Overpayment liability is never eliminated, regardless of whether and by whom the screening was performed. So your deliverable is retainable evidence for each person, refreshed each month. Worth knowing too that exclusion screening is not itself a federal requirement: OIG’s words are that providers are not required by statute or regulation to check the list. OIG recommends monthly checks because the list updates monthly, and many state Medicaid contracts impose monthly checks anyway. (OIG, Updated Special Advisory Bulletin on the Effect of Exclusion, 8 May 2013, pp. 12 and n.21, 15 to 16; 42 CFR 455.436)

No. The regulation says service agents are not employers for the purposes of that part, so the query belongs to the employer and no contract moves it. Where you are the DOT employer, you query. Where the carrier is, the carrier queries. The driver qualification file works the same way: a carrier may designate you as its agent to run the qualification procedures, and FMCSA is explicit that the carrier remains liable for any violation committed by its agent. Agency moves the work rather than the exposure. (49 CFR 382.701(a); 49 CFR 382.107; 49 CFR 391.51(a); FMCSA Regulatory Guidance to 49 CFR 391.63, Question 2)

The host records it if it supervises the worker on a day-to-day basis, and the two of you coordinate so each injury is recorded once. Everything else in OSHA’s temporary worker material is guidance rather than a standard, and none of it requires a background check. (29 CFR 1904.31(b)(2), (b)(4))

Most reports are back within a day. Primary source credential verification and drug testing depend on a third party, so book those against the start date. We will tell you which parts of a package are done and which are waiting.

You do, or your client does, and the page above is largely about telling those two apart. KRESS supplies verified data and the notification workflow. The placement decision, including any individualized assessment, belongs to the employer making it.