5 Reasons There Could Be a Delay in Your Background Check
Has your background check company ever given you an Estimated Time of Arrival (ETA) for a report and then not met that ETA? The ETA comes from an average of searches. Some searches may require additional time to obtain court case information. If there is a delay in your background check ETA, there could be outside factors affecting this.
1. Mercy of the Court
One main reason is “mercy of the court”. What does that mean? It means you literally are at the mercy of the court. The court has most information on their public access terminal, but other specifics have to be obtained by the clerk. The search request goes to the clerk and when they complete it, results are given to the researcher. When this happens you are at the mercy of the clerk to obtain this information which would delay the request.
Some counties are not regimented on how many hours per day clerks complete these searches. Other counties, the clerks feel completing those searches is one of their job duties that is at the bottom of the to-do list. Clerks in some counties are also short staffed making it even harder to get through those to do lists and completing those name searches. Some county searches can be completed without a clerk until a potential record is found. Then the search becomes clerk assisted. When this happens they review identifiers on the case and/or view the case details. Another reason why the ETA might not be met is the search request is lost by the clerk. It does not happen very often, however, can happen from time-to-time.
Your next question is probably “what counties are at the mercy of the court”? Below is a list of some counties that are the mercy of the court. It is not a full list by any means. It is a great start for counties in California, Nevada, Vermont and a few others.
Known list of “Mercy of the Court” Counties by State
- Arkansas (AR)
- Monroe
- Californa (CA)
- Orange
- Contra Costa
- Imperial
- Los Angeles
- Riverside
- San Bernardino
- San Diego
- Mississippi (MI)
- Harrison
- Hinds
- New Hampshire (NH)
- Grafton
- Nevada (NV)
- Carson City
- Churchill
- Clark
- Douglas
- Elko
- Eureka
- Humboldt
- Nye
- Storey
- Washoe
- White Pine
- Rhode Island (RI)
- All counties in Rhode Island
- Tennessee (TN)
- All counties in Tennessee
- Vermont (VT)
- Caledonia
- Rutland
- Windham
- Wyoming (WY)
- Campbell
2. Inaccurate or Omitted Applicant Information.
There may be incorrect information on the report. Examples of this would be the applicant’s name is misspelled, incorrect Social Security Number or their Date of Birth is wrong. When this happens we have to follow up with the applicant and verify the information.
3. County Workers on Strike.
Another reason could be the counties have gone on strike. This does not happen very often, but when it does, none of the searches are being worked for the amount of time the they are on strike. This could be anywhere from a couple of days to a couple of weeks. This then leads to a delay in ETA’s.
4. Employment and Education References.
Employment and Education Verifications are another area for a delay in ETA. When these are done, we reach out to the employer or the school to retrieve the necessary information. One Source has a policy of making three attempts to contact the necessary resource for information. If after the three attempts, they don’t provide a response, we then consider it closed. However, this process can sometimes delay the ETA by a couple of days.
5. National Holidays.
When there is a national holiday, the courts are closed. An example of this would be all Louisiana parishes are closed on November 1st for All Saints Day. No searches for that county are run on the days they are closed.
There are many reasons why an ETA might not always be met: from mercy of the court, to weather and verification. Many of these are out of the reporter’s control. So the next time you talk to your background screening company about an ETA, ask them if there is a known cause to the delay.
