What to Look for in a Background Screening Automation Provider

At InformData, we’re big advocates for automating criminal background checks and court research where the quality matches or exceeds in-person research. Over the years, it’s become clear that automation is the key to unlocking the growth potential of your Consumer Reporting Agency (CRA). As we’ve pointed out, automated tools can be more efficient, more reliable, and more cost-effective than large teams of human researchers.

CRAs can choose to build and manage their own automation capabilities or partner with a data provider – both of which have pros and cons. Most businesses choose to partner because the former option is incredibly challenging and resource-intensive. So, if you take the data partner route, how can you be sure the background screening automation provider you choose will deliver on their promises surrounding automation?

These days, most successful background screening companies lean towards a consolidated supplier strategy. By working primarily with a few select providers, you can secure the highest discounts. Therefore, your choice of criminal record and court data provider(s) is critical because those providers will likely be your go-to data source for the bulk of your data… which means their quality and reliability become an extension of yours.

We encourage you to shop carefully, weighing the following characteristics alongside the usual considerations, such as cost.

6 Traits That Set the Best Automated Court Research and Criminal Record Data Providers Apart from the Rest

The quality benchmark for background checks is the results a team of expert researchers can produce.

You know you’re on the right track with a provider when you can’t tell the difference between the reports they provide and those you would expect from manual processes (or when the reports are better!). After all, the goal is to replace or supplement the work of manual researchers with the efficiency, flexibility, and cost-effectiveness of automation.

Working with the wrong automation provider and passing on inaccurate data can expose your CRA to unacceptable levels of risk. A reliable provider:

• Provides comprehensive searches that cover the necessary timeframes and record types to support your reporting guidelines under the FCRA (Fair Credit Reporting Act).
• Has data discrepancy alerts in place that highlight any gaps or inconsistencies that require manual intervention.

For example, let’s say you ordered a background check covering seven years of felony and misdemeanor convictions. However, your provider’s automated search scraped information from a county website covering only five years of felony data. If your provider fails to alert you to this discrepancy or doesn’t make up for it by running manual searches, your company could face legal repercussions.

Additionally, when it comes to high-quality data, your automation provider should have robust quality assurance processes in place to ensure the continued reliability of their automation programs and the data they pass to you.

You shouldn’t have to take your provider’s word for it when it comes to their data sources. A transparent automation partner will provide an HTML snapshot of every webpage from which they extracted information. This way, if a quality issue arises and attorneys come calling, you will have timestamped screenshots ready to go that document the time, date, and location where each record was found.

An audit trail of screenshots also enhances a provider’s client services capabilities. When customers have concerns or questions about a result, the provider can compare the screenshots to a new extraction and ask, “What did our processor look at in this audit trail to produce that result?” This process helps isolate issues and identify educational opportunities.

What happens when court records go offline or become unavailable digitally? A reliable and experienced provider will have a backup plan. They will be prepared to transition seamlessly to manual researchers to continue supplying you with the records you need with minimal downtime, regardless of the county or the circumstances.

Criminal background check information shouldn’t come in a one-size-fits-all format. Different clients require different types of information in a variety of formats. Your automation provider should be able to customize your results according to your needs.

For example:

• Are you only interested in a specific time period?
• Do you want to exclude traffic cases?
• Do you care about dismissed misdemeanors?

A high-quality background screening automation provider will filter and format the data to meet the specifications of you and your customers. That way, you can more than likely pass the results on directly to your customers instead of using internal resources to button up the results, extending turnaround time further.

As with any type of provider, longevity in the background screening industry tends to signify quality.

In the grand scheme of things, the technology to scrape court websites for information has not existed for that long. The most reliable providers started developing their techniques in the earliest days of the industry, about a decade or so ago. These providers have had time to thoroughly test their software, refine and optimize, and build comprehensive county databases.

Bonus Tip: Aside from assessing a potential automation provider's technical capabilities, experience and reliability, we also recommend looking for a partner that offers diverse pricing structures. From flexible pricing to subscription-based or transaction-based, having different options available allows you to choose what works best for your business.

By prioritizing these key considerations, you can confidently choose a background screening automation provider that enhances your CRA’s efficiency, accuracy, and growth.

What About InformData?

At InformData, we’ve been automating criminal background checks for over a decade. We leverage the most advanced software automation tools while maintaining a team of highly skilled researchers. This unique combination ensures efficient, reliable, and high-quality background screening solutions that empower your CRA to thrive. If you’d like to learn more about how our automation can benefit your business, contact us today.

Stay tuned for an upcoming blog for a behind-the-scenes look at InformData's automation approach – subscribe here if you’d like to be notified when new articles are published.