An Australian business owner is directly responsible for creating a safe working environment. This refers primarily to making sure health and safety regulations are implemented and observed at all times. At the same time, the employer has a duty to ensure all the employees are properly vetted, so everyone can feel safe and secure in the workplace. One of the main tools business owners have at their disposal are criminal history checks. Here’s how using background checks can help you create a safer workplace.
Reduce the risks of workplace theft
Workplace theft is a plague affecting all businesses, big or small, all over the world. Employees stealing from their employers cost global businesses billions of dollars per year. However, when you employ someone with theft and fraud on their criminal record you’re practically inviting them to steal them from you and from their workmates.
This is not to say you should not employ people with a criminal record ever. They deserve a chance to turn their lives over. The idea is that you should be aware of the offences on their record. And they’ll know you know. This is a very good thing as an ex-offender will try to be on his or her best behaviour. They’ll seldom risk doing anything stupid knowing that the suspicion will fall on them immediately.
Say no to sexual harassment in the workplace
What do you do when you order a crime background check on a potential employee and you discover they have convictions of a sexual nature on their record? With thieves or fraudsters, yes, you can give them another chance, but you’ll have to give it a lot of thought before hiring someone with rape or sexual abuse offences on their record.
For instance, if women account for a large part of your staff can you really take the risk of bringing a rapist in their midst? Probably not, especially if they’re going to be working in close proximity.
At the same time, you cannot afford to hire a person with a history of sexual offences if they’re going to interact with your customers on a regular basis and represent your company. Besides the obvious distress such interaction might cause to any of your female customers, imagine the damage to your company’s reputation if such a story makes it to the press or the all-powerful social media. You’re basically ruined if this happens and you’re going to be blamed for the bad hire.
Making criminal history checks mandatory
If you don’t want to risk a discrimination lawsuit, you’ll need to make national police checks mandatory for all employees. It’s not that a certain guy looks weird or you don’t like the skin color of that other guy and feel like doing a background check on them. Make criminal history checks part of your hiring policy and find an online character check agency to work with e.g. services like Australian national character check – https://www.australiannationalcharactercheck.com.au/ which require information you can upload in minutes and you’ll get a 100% valid police check in a matter of days.
This is the only way you can make sure you’re not hiring dangerous people who might create troubles in the future.
