Conducting background checks before employment offer has been accepted

Q         If we’ve made a job offer but the prospective employee hasn’t accepted it yet, do we have to wait to conduct a background check?

A   The short answer is “probably not.” It’s actually quite common to conduct the background check once a conditional offer has been extended. It isn’t against federal law to perform a background check before making a job offer, although certain states have laws that don’t allow this. In many cases this approach is not considered the best practice because it can give a rejected applicant the idea information obtained during the pre-offer background check was illegally used against them.

Additionally, many states have implemented “ban the box” laws limiting the abilities of employers to ask about applicants’ criminal histories to specific stages of the hiring process (sometimes until after a conditional offer has been made). In Maine, certain state government employees are protected from pre-employment criminal history inquiries, but there is no “ban the box” legislation in place for private employers at this time.