As a hiring manager, you have often experienced a situation where making an important hiring decision is thwarted by a delay, only to have the candidate disappear, or be upset at what they perceive as overbearing, or unnecessary hiring processes. Let’s face it, once a decision has been made to hire for a position, recruiting for that position has happened, requisite interviews are completed and a critical decision has been arrived at, a significant investment in the individual(s) chosen to hire has been made. That person needs to be in place as soon as possible and the next step should be the background investigation to ensure the candidate meets your organization’s consistent standards and requirements. As is often the case, one of the integral components of a thorough background investigation is the criminal record check.  

As with all of Canada’s modern screening providers’ services, candidate consent is required to conduct a criminal record check, reference check, driver’s history, credit summary or whatever other service is determined to meet the requirements for the particular position.

The next important step for a criminal record check is to reliably demonstrate and prove the identity of a candidate. This is an RCMP mandated requirement for Criminal Record Checks. Historically, the identity of the candidate was authenticated in a number of ways:

1. In-person by the hiring manager with production of specific identification or documents
2. Electronic Identification Verification, EID (more on this in a moment)
3. The candidate’s attendance at an offsite identification location, such as Canada Post
4. By fingerprints

Candidate behaviour has changed, and the positions being filled have changed equally. Today’s on-demand world has changed employment dramatically over the past few years and candidates expect a technology solution to be available. Fortunately, ScreeningCanada has kept pace with these expectations and brought forth LiveVideoID.

All screening services, including the police, employ personal ID verification.

ScreeningCanada, and almost all online screening providers, employ EID whereby the candidate is asked a number of out-of-wallet questions from their credit history that only they will know the answer to, proving the person at the end of the keyboard is who they say they are.

Upon successfully answering the customized questions, the candidate has proved to the screening provider that “they are who they say they are”, thereby satisfying RCMP identity verification requirements and allowing the criminal record check to be initiated. When this process runs smoothly, this is extremely fast, secure, and convenient for candidates and employers.

The only problem is that as much as 20% of the population is unable to complete this EID process for several valid reasons. Why? They may not know their financial details, they are new to the country, or they may be young or new to the employment world and don’t have an identifiable credit history to derive the questions from. Sometimes, they simply fail to answer the questions correctly or will not navigate the online processes successfully.

The common off-ramp for these people is to send them to an offsite identification authenticator, such as the mentioned Canada Post, or have fingerprints taken at a police service or other authorized provider. Both of these solutions are inconvenient, requiring the candidate to travel, spend extra time and potentially even added expenses such as a ride service, parking, etc. In the case of fingerprinting, it is all of those inconveniences, PLUS the significant costs associated to the actual fingerprinting service and RCMP fees (often upwards of $50). In any of these situations that involve delay or extra costs, a candidate may simply disappear from your hiring radar and you must start the entire process again. Many times, you may not even know why.

How do you ensure your onboarding process is enhanced, and the candidate completes their checks?

There is now a compliant alternative for the candidate who is unable to complete Electronic ID Verification. A modern, convenient and police approved solution, LiveVideoID is now offered only by ScreeningCanada.

LiveVideoID, ScreeningCanada’s proprietary video identification service, approved by Canadian police services, allows candidates to easily authenticate their ID from ANYWHERE using their laptop, their desktop, or most importantly using their smartphone! With LiveVideoID, your chosen candidate can conveniently, without any travel and using a smartphone, contact ScreeningCanada’s trained Customer Success representatives, engage with a live person-to-person conversation, which is recorded for documentation and forwarded to the police service conducting the enquiries.

Within minutes, they can be guided to produce the required ID to allow complete verification. Our ScreeningCanada representatives, based in Canada, will offer guidance and assistance in either of Canada’s official languages to allow your candidate to upload their mandated identification and perform quick tasks that ensure that they are who they say they are. The service is available seven days a week and is completed within just a few minutes from wherever they are, whether it be their home, on the road or even at one of your remote sites.

Compliance and security are at the forefront of LiveVideoID’s service delivery. The entire LiveVideoID process has been vetted and approved by Canadian police services to ensure compliance with RCMP guidelines. The video identification service adheres to compliance requirements for Know Your Client (KYC) and Anti-Money Laundering (AML) compliance set out by FINTRAC, while providing a best-in-class user experience for individuals.

ScreeningCanada’s trained and screened service agents are bilingual and hold up-to-date level 7 clearance with police services. They have been thoroughly trained to receive and conduct identification verifications through LiveVideoID.

The entire process is completely auditable with all ID Verification information being stored via transcript within the ScreeningCanada platform to be accessed when required. The ID verification information is also fully available to our police partners.

LiveVideoID eliminates the time a candidate may take to travel to a secondary ID authentication center. Remote hiring is easily and quickly accommodated by the use of LiveVideoID, and the opportunity for a candidate to select a second opportunity based on time is reduced. In today’s gig economy, candidates are looking to join modern organizations quickly and easily, with a shortened time period between the interview and the actual start.

Similarly, employers seek to streamline their onboarding processes, yet remain true to their objectives of documented due diligence. A shortened route to an early start date can manifest in a “bad hire” if shortcuts are taken, but you can rest assured that LiveVideoID ensures your hiring is compliant and uses enhanced technology to ease the challenges faced by other processes.