Who watches the watchmen?
Hired any good security guards lately? Unless you’re a really big business, the answer to that question is probably, “No.”
Most small companies don’t hire security guards. Instead they contract with a security company to provide guard services. And that can be dangerous.
According to Bill Whitmore, President and CEO, AlliedBarton Security Services, quoted in Chief Engineer: “Our country has no national background check system to ensure all private security officer personnel can be quickly vetted and screened.”
Did that surprise you? The very people you’re counting on to protect your property might be people you have to worry about.
Whitmore didn’t mean that his company didn’t have access to any background check services. He does, just like you do. He was pointing out that federal records are closed to him.
There’s legislation on the way to fix the problem, supported by key security industry groups. In the meantime, though, you should think about checking any contract you have with a firm that provides you with guard services.
Ask your guard company how they screen the people they’re sending to your premises. Get your answer in writing.
Review your contract. Better yet, have your attorney review it. Find out what recourse you have if one of the contract security people is involved in criminal activities that cause you to suffer a loss.
What to do when there is drug activity on your rental property
In Wooster, Ohio there’s a police detective giving landlords advice. The advice isn’t unique to his town or even to Ohio.
The fact is that in most cities, the majority of the illegal drug activity happens on rental property. A drug dealer may rent property and then use the location either as a place to sell drugs or a place for buyers to use drugs.
Many times the dealer doesn’t even need to rent the property himself. He can find a customer or associate to rent the property and then just show up and start doing business. If you’re a landlord, that can be bad for you in several ways.
Drug users are really hard on property. Ask any landlord who’s had it happen. Things get broken. Holes get punched in walls. Often, the place is wrecked.
When drug dealers move in, good tenants start moving out. It doesn’t take long before drug users are the majority.
So, watch for signs of drug activity. One of them is a sudden increase in tenant complaints about noise or rowdy activity at all hours. Your local police department can tell you others.
Since many tenants won’t complain, check out your property from time to time. Don’t just go in the middle of the afternoon. Drive by at night and on weekends.
If you think there may be drug activity on your property, contact your local police. In some jurisdictions, the police will let landlords know if there are arrests for drug activity on their property. […]
Supreme court rules that insurance companies did not violate FCRA
The Insurance Journal reports that the Supreme Court has ruled in favor of two insurance companies, GEICO and Safeco. The companies were accused of violating the Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA).
There were actually two rulings. Even though they don’t relate directly and specifically to background checks or tenant screening, there are still important things here for you.
The Court ruled that GEICO did not violate the FCRA. The company had used a credit check to in the process of determining what rate to charge a customer, but it did not affect the final rate offered.
In the case of Safeco, the court ruled that they had violated the law, but they had not done so recklessly. The court ruling means that both GEICO and Safeco have escaped having to pay huge damage awards.
If you’re using credit checks as part of your employee or tenant background check process, there are some things to pay attention to.
The reason that this was a big deal is that the government takes the FCRA seriously and more and more the people you will be screening know about it. You can get in big trouble if you don’t do things right.
If you’re in doubt about what you need to do, check out some of the resources on this blog. One resource is Understanding FCRA rules for employment screening.
You could look at these rulings and figure that you’re going to be all right as long as you’re not “reckless” in the way you use credit […]
Patient Safety and Abuse Prevention Act
It’s scary that you should have to check the backgrounds of people who care for the elderly, but that’s part of what will be legally required when the Patient Safety and Abuse Prevention Act becomes law. Note that I said, “when” and not “if.”
The bill, authored by Senator Herb Kohl (D-WI), Chairman of the Senate Special Committee on Aging, and Senator Pete Domenici (R-NM), is picking up supporters of all kinds according to Senior Journal. Powerful Senators like Carl Levin (D-MI) and presidential hopeful Hillary Clinton (D-NY) have signed on as co-sponsors.
The bill has also picked up support from influential organizations. The American Health Care Association (AHCA), an affiliation of state health organizations representing more than ten thousand non-profit and for-profit assisted living, nursing facility, developmentally-disabled, and sub-acute care providers, has endorsed it.
Even though I’m sure the bill will pass, no one can predict exactly what form it will take. We can be pretty sure of a couple of things, though.
We can be sure that the bill will require all facilities that care for the elderly to do what many such facilities already do. Elder-care facilities will have to run pre-employment background checks on anyone who applies for a job.
We can be sure that the bill will address issues that are similar to the ones we’ve seen with background checks for gun owners. Forty-one states now require these background checks, but the databases that support them are inconsistent and not coordinated. The American Association of […]
Preventing workplace violence with background checks
In 1995, the Workplace Violence Research Institute found that: “Every workday, an estimated 16,400 threats are made, 723 workers are attacked, and 43,800 are harassed.”
That’s a lot of violence. Most of it isn’t dramatic cable-news-coverage stuff, but none of it makes for a better workplace. When violence is part of the working environment, productivity and morale both drop.
Your first line of defense is to hire smart, do your criminal checks, check references, and use other employment screening tools. Watch for things in a person’s past that might indicate trouble ahead. This can also help prevent a negligent hiring lawsuit if bad things happen later.
But even so, a great deal of workplace violence doesn’t come from people with a police record or a history of violence. It comes from people who are frustrated and angry and bring that anger to work with them. So part of your task is to spot potential problems early.
Dawn Kubik is an attorney with Mountain States Employers Council Inc. in Colorado Springs. She’s written an excellent piece in the Colorado Springs Business Journal called Minimizing the cost of violence in the workplace. She includes a list of warning signs.
- Attack behavior (threats/intimidation/bullying)
- History of violence
- Poor impulse control
- Lack of personal support systems
- Sense of injustice — desire to get even
- Substance abuse
- Obsession with another person
- Mental illness
- Preoccupation with violence/weapons
Don’t just watch for these things yourself. Enlist the help of your supervisors and workers.
When you’re working next to a person day after day, you know right away […]
Preventing employee theft
The Arizona Republic has a great article titled Facing the issue of employee theft. The paper zeros in on the need for small businesses to be aware that it’s not just the Wal-Marts of the world who suffer from fraud losses. Here’s a quote:
The 2006 report by the Association of Certified Fraud Examiners showed that businesses with fewer than 100 employees suffered a median of $190,000 in fraud losses. Without safeguards, any business is susceptible to fraud, especially common forms like check tampering, fraudulent billing and stealing money before it’s recorded.
Look at that figure. For Wal-Mart, $190,000 is a rounding error. For a small business, it could be a killing blow. In addition to careful, due-diligence hiring including a background check, here are some things you can do to prevent insider fraud and limit its potential impact.
- Sign your own checks
- Have an way that employees can report fraud anonymously
- Get to know your company financial records (you should do this anyway)
- Conduct surprise audits
Here’s the most important thing: implement a system of checks and balances. In most small business fraud cases, one employee was allowed to work essentially unchecked.