Assess

Assess allows you to define adjudication rules across your team, hiring location, or company. Use the Assess page to:

• Understand Assess values
• Understand the hierarchy of rules
• Define global settings
• Create a new ruleset
  • Fairness and compliance rules
  • Custom rules
  • Lookback period rules
  • Count rules
• Assign rulesets
• Publish your ruleset
• Duplicate rulesets
• View previous versions of rulesets

Checkr Assess allows you to streamline your team’s adjudication process by defining rules by which returned records will be evaluated. When displayed in the Checkr Dashboard, these records will then be tagged to indicate the result of this preprocessing.

When a report is complete, any records that have not been filtered by PAM are matched against your eligibility criteria rules and assigned an outcome: “Eligible.” “Review,” or “Escalated.” The report is then assigned an overall outcome based on the screenings included within it.

You can create rules to evaluate Global Watchlist returns, Sex Offender Registry records, criminal records, and motor vehicle records. Records returned by Health Checks, Employment and Education Verifications, and other Checkr screening options that your Assess rules don't filter will be marked "Review."

Use the Assess page to define rules by which your eligibility criteria will apply to candidate records. To enforce standardized application across your adjudication teams, you can then assign these rules to your packages, candidate geos (work locations), segments, or programs.

The Assessment column on the Candidates page shows the results of these rules:

• Clear: The report returned no records.

• Eligible: The report returned no records that would make the candidate ineligible.

• Review: The report returned at least one record that needs evaluation based on your rules.

• Escalated: The report returned at least one record flagged based on your rules.

Assess values

Checkr Assess allows you to define adjudication rules that apply to records returned by criminal checks, employment and education verifications, motor vehicle records, criminal checks, and other Checkr screening options. Assess then applies a color-coded tag to each returned record or screening result, and each candidate report with one of three Assessment values:

• Eligible: The report returned no records that would make the candidate ineligible.

• Review: The report returned at least one record that needs evaluation based on your rules.

• Escalated: The report returned at least one record flagged based on your rules.

Assess rules

Assess allows you to configure four types of rules:

• Fairness and compliance rules: Adopt certain predefined rules designed to align with emerging best practices and Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) guidance for the consideration of criminal records. These rules can apply globally across all criminal records.
• Custom rules: Define custom rules that span charge categories, noncriminal screenings, lookback periods, and candidate age.
• Lookback period rules: Set "age limits" for each of 235 charge categories to be considered Eligible, Review, or Escalated. You can customize your criteria by the age of the record as well as the record type within each category.
• Count rules: Define rules based on the number of times in a defined period of time that a selected record type appears in a candidate's background. These rules apply across categories and other rule types.

Hierarchy of rules

Checkr Assess follows a hierarchy of rules to assess a charge.

First, Checkr filters records based on compliance rules for your account. Then, if your account has enabled our Positive Adjudication Matrix, the rules from that matrix apply and filter appropriate records from the report. Finally, your Assess rulesets apply to remaining records.

Assess rules are applied in the following order:

1. Fairness and compliance rules
2. Custom rules
3. Lookback period rules

When one of these rules is triggered, an assessment for the record is applied, and no further evaluation using these rules occurs for the record.

For example: If a record is marked Eligible by an implemented fairness and compliance rule, no other rule will be applied to the record. If a record is not evaluated by the compliance rules but is marked Escalated by a custom rule, lookback period rules won't apply.

Finally, count rules are applied after all others and are used to globally evaluate all returned records. When triggered, count rules can change the assessment of a record. For more information, refer to Count Rules later in this document.

Define global settings

Use the Settings tab to define global settings for Assess.

To help reduce bias and enable your adjudicators to work more efficiently, Assess allows you to choose how records that are Eligible according to your rules are displayed or hidden in the default view of Records in the Checkr Dashboard.

If enabled, these settings will be applied to all assessed records for your account.

• Display Eligible records: Displays records marked Eligible in the Checkr Dashboard, Candidate Portal, report PDF, and returns these records through the Checkr API. 
• Conceal Eligible records in the Dashboard: Conceals records marked Eligible in the Checkr Dashboard behind a "Show more" option. These records will be displayed in the Candidate Portal and report PDFs, and will be returned through the Checkr APIs.
• Remove Eligible records: Removes records marked Eligible from all available report views. These records will also not be returned through the Checkr APIs.
• Hide charges with Assessment "Eligible" from the Pre-Adverse Action modal: Records marked Eligible will not be included in the list of records available for selection for a pre-adverse action on the candidate's report page.
• Auto-engage candidates when their report is assessed as "Eligible": Automatically marks candidates Engaged if their report is marked Eligible. If enabled, users must also select the Packages for which candidates assessed as Eligible will be marked Engaged.

Create a new ruleset

From the Assess page, click Add a new ruleset to create a ruleset.

• In the window that opens, enter a name for your ruleset, and click Create. This name must be unique within your account.
• Then, use the Assess rulesets window to add a description, and define your rules.

Fairness and compliance rules

The Fairness & compliance tab allows you to adopt predefined evaluation settings to quickly filter more records eligible for your hiring practices.

Use these settings to align your review procedures with EEOC Enforcement Guidance based on record outcome, severity, time since offense, and age at offense. These settings also reflect common compliance practices used by many employers, and allow your adjudicators to focus on a more fair evaluation of your candidates.

Click the caret to expand the bar for a more complete description of each option. Then, click the checkbox to indicate that you would like to apply the settings to your returned background check results. Records returned within the selected categories will be marked Eligible in the Checkr Dashboard. (Use the Custom Rules tab to create custom versions of these settings for your account.)

Fairness and Compliance rules are grouped in the following sections:

• Non-convictions
• Charge severity & timing
• Charge type
• Candidate details

Non-convictions

• Dismissed charges are eligible
  
  • A dismissed disposition means the charge did NOT result in a conviction. This classification covers both dismissals and findings of non-guilt. For example, the court dropped the charge against the defendant or the defendant was found not guilty or responsible after trial.
  • By allowing dismissed charges to be assessed as "Eligible", you can better align your evaluation practices to EEOC Enforcement Guidance that states the existence of a criminal record alone does not mean criminal conduct has occurred.

• Non-felony deferred / alternative adjudication charges are eligible
  
  • A deferred or alternative adjudication charge has NOT resulted in a conviction. In most cases, deferred and alternative adjudications result in some form of court supervision instead of jail time and a criminal conviction. Upon successful completion, the charges are often dismissed.
  • The entry of alternative judgment can show the court believes the defendant is a good candidate for rehabilitation and does not pose a danger to the community. By allowing non-felony dismissed alternative adjudication charges, you can better demonstrate your practice of giving careful consideration to the gravity of charges.

• All pending charges are eligible
  
  • Pending charges have not yet received a final adjudication (or outcome), and are either still being reviewed by the prosecutor or currently progressing through court.
  • Allowing pending charges to be assessed as "Eligible" helps you to avoid the possibility of disqualifying a candidate based on an assumption of guilt for a charge that does not yet have a verdict.

Charge severity & timing

• Charges with less-than-misdemeanor severity are eligible
  
  • These are the lowest level severity charges, such as infractions, can include both convictions and non-convictions, and are typically punishable only by fines.
  • Removing lower severity charges from your evaluation can both expand your funnel and better align your practices to consider the severity of the charge as the more important factor.
• Non-felony charges older than 7 years are eligible
  
  • Charges can be either convictions or non-convictions. Under the FCRA, non-convictions (like dismissed charges) are reportable for up to 7 years, and convictions are reportable indefinitely. To help protect access to employment, some states restrict the reporting of all records (regardless of outcome) beyond 7 years.
  • By allowing non-felony charges that are older than 7 years to be assessed as “Eligible”, you can align your evaluation practices to be consistent with a growing trend in state consumer protection laws and better demonstrate that your policy takes time since offense into consideration. Policies that create permanent exclusion from all employment based on any and all offenses are likely inconsistent with the business necessity standard and can create unintended consequences in the makeup of your workforce. 

• All charges older than 7 years are eligible
  
  • The age of the charge itself is an important factor when evaluating candidates.
  • By allowing charges that are older than 7 years to be assessed as “Eligible”, you can align your evaluation practices to be consistent with a growing trend in state consumer protection laws and better demonstrate that your policy takes time since offense into consideration. Policies that create permanent exclusion from all employment based on any and all offenses are likely inconsistent with the business necessity standard and can create unintended consequences in the makeup of your workforce. 

Charge type

• Non-felony marijuana possession charges are eligible
  
  • Marijuana possession is a specific category of criminal charges and can be either a conviction or a non-conviction. This classification does not include cultivation or sale.
  • Removing lower level marijuana possession charges can help you to better align your evaluation practices with the changing landscape of legalization of medical and recreational marijuana use.

• Non-felony drug possession and paraphernalia charges are eligible
  
  • Non-felony charges can be either convictions or non-convictions. This setting combines specific categories of criminal charges (Drug Possession, Intent to Possess Drugs, Possession of Drug Paraphernalia, Possession of Drug without Prescription) with severity (charge level).
  • With this setting, you will allow lower level drug possession charges to be assessed as "Eligible", and help you to better align your practices with both job relatedness and charge severity.

• Vehicle & traffic charges are eligible (excludes charges resulting in death and DUIs)
  
  • This category includes all charges within the categories of Unsafe Operation, Speeding, License & Registration, Vehicle Equipment, and Parking. They do NOT include any charges related to Driving Under the Influence, Hit & Run Causing Death, or Reckless Driving Causing Death.
  • With this setting, you will allow Vehicle & Traffic charges to be assessed as "Eligible", and help you to better align your practices with both job relatedness and charge severity.

• Public nuisance charges are eligible
  
  • This setting assesses all charges in the Public Nuisance section as “Eligible”. This includes the following charges: Disorderly Conduct, Littering, Loitering, Maintain a Disorderly House, Noise Ordinance Violation, Obstruct Passageway, Public Urination, Unlawful Storage.
  • This setting can help to better align your practices with both job relatedness and severity. Public nuisance charges have been critiqued as potentially discriminatory towards communities of color, persons with mental disabilities and domestic violence survivors.

• Prostitution charges are eligible
  
  • This setting assess the following charges as “Eligible”: Promoting Prostitution, Prostitution, and Soliciting a Prostitute. It does NOT include the charge Prostitution Involving Minor.
  • This setting can help to better align your practices with both job relatedness and severity. Prostitution charges can disproportionately discriminate against women.

Candidate details

• Charges when candidate's age was under 25 if the candidate is now over 28 are eligible
  
  • The age of the candidate at the time of offense is an important factor when evaluating eligibility. Charges that occurred when the individual was 25 years old or younger will be assessed as "Eligible" if and only if the candidate is currently more than 28 years old.
  • Selecting this option allows you to better align with the EEOC recommendation to consider factors such as the candidate’s age at the time of offense when determining employment for candidates with records.

• Charges when candidate's age was under 18 are eligible
  
  • The age of the candidate at the time of offense is an important factor when evaluating eligibility. Charges that occurred when the individual was 18 years old or younger will be assessed as "Eligible".
  • Selecting this option allows you to better align with the EEOC recommendation to consider factors such as the candidate’s age at the time of offense when determining employment for candidates with records.

Create custom rules

Custom rules allow you to define rules which will apply across all charge categories and can include variables such as the number of offenses, the age of the record, and the candidate’s age at disposition. The rules apply in the listed order. If you click to edit a rule, you can reorder the list.

Rules can include multiple conditions, all of which must be true to apply your selected assessment.

Click Create new rule to add a new custom rule.

1. Enter a rule name.
2. Select an Assessment: Eligible, Review, or Escalated.
3. Select Applies to from the menu.
   • Options include Criminal Charge, Education Verification, Credit Report, FACIS Search, and other Checkr screening types enabled for your account.
4. Click Add a condition, and select a condition from the menu:
   
   • Age at offense is
   • Charge is
   • Charge severity is
   • Count is
   • Disposition is
   • Years since charge is
   • MVR status was
   • Registered on list
5. Use the second pulldown menu to define the parameters of the condition. This menu will update automatically according to your selection in the first menu.
6. Add more conditions to define your rule, and click Save.

Once saved, Checkr will display a synopsis of your rule. Use the icons to copy, edit, or delete the rule, if desired.

Non-conviction charges

For compliance purposes, charges without a conviction disposition should always be reviewed. These charges should be reviewed and carefully considered before a final adjudication decision is made.

Non-conviction charges include:

• Arrest
• Deferred/alternative adjudication
• Dismissed
• Expunged
• Invalid
• Merged
• Pending
• Transferred
• Warrant

Lookback period rules

Use the Lookback period rules tab to configure lookback periods for 235 charge categories and 3 different charge severity classifications (felony, misdemeanor, and less-than-misdemeanor).

Lookback periods are measured as the number of years since the context date on a record. For criminal charges, the context date is the most recent event in the charge's history. For example, if the most recent event is the release date, the context date is the release date. If the most recent event is the arrest date, that is the context date. 

By default, all charge categories are set to Review for your defined lookback periods. 

For each charge type, enter the number of years’ lookback period to define each Eligible or Escalated tag. Any records occurring between these two defined lookback periods will be set to Review.

Click the charge type for a description of the category. These definitions are general descriptors for the charges identified within each charge category, and do not represent specific legal or statutory definitions for the crimes identified on consumer reports. Checkr recommends assigning lookback periods for each individual charge category.

For example, to define lookback periods for speeding records, click Vehicles & Traffic, then click Speeding.

Use the fields provided to enter lookback periods for charges more than the number of years entered in the Eligible column, and less than the number of years entered in the Escalated column. All charges falling between these two entries will be marked Review. Any cell without an assigned lookback period will default to Review.

For example: Enter “7” in the Eligible column, and “2” in the Escalated column to achieve the following result.

In the following example:

• All Felony speeding records less than 7 years old will be marked Escalated, and all others will be marked Review. (Enter 7 for Escalated, and leave Eligible blank.)
• All Misdemeanor records more than 5 years old will be marked Eligible, less than two years old will be marked Escalated, and 2-5 years old will be marked Review. (Enter 5 for Eligible, and 2 for Escalated.)
• All speeding records that are less than misdemeanors will be marked Eligible. (Enter 0 for Eligible.)

Use CSVs to export or import lookback period rules

Checkr provides the means to use CSVs to manage your lookback period rules.

• Click Download template to download a blank template.
• Click Export to export your configured lookback period ruleset as a CSV.

Once downloaded, you can edit your existing ruleset by uploading an edited CSV. All new rules will overwrite any existing rules. Click Import to import your CSV as a new lookback ruleset. 

Count rules

Use the Count rules tab to define rules which will filter on the number of records returned for any selected category across the entire report.

Count rules evaluate all records returned in a report and count those that match their conditions. Count rules are applied across all records, including those evaluated by your fairness & compliance, custom, or lookback period rules.

The application of count rules to records evaluated by other rules can result in a change to their assessment. For example, count rules can result in assessments for individual records changing from Eligible to Escalated or Review; they will never result in assessments moving from Escalated to Eligible or Review, or moving from Review to Eligible.

Count rule examples

For example: Create a lookback period rule that states “mark speeding offenses more than 4 years old as Eligible" and a count rule that states "Count is more than 3" with an assessment of Review.

• If 3 speeding records greater than 4 years old are returned, they will be marked Eligible, but if 4 speeding records are returned, no matter their age, all 4 will be marked Review.

While count rules apply “Count is” logic across all returned records, count rules will never result in an assessment that requires less review by your adjudication team than the assessment applied by your other Checkr Assess rules.

Assign rulesets

After a ruleset has been published, assign it to the work location, program, package, or segments to which it should be applied. You can also make a ruleset the default for your account.

Rulesets can be assigned to multiple entities (such as work locations, programs, and packages), and to multiple combinations of entities (such as package and work location). When rulesets are applied to records, the more restrictive assignment will take precedence over more general assignments.

Assignments are applied in the following order:

1. Package + work location
2. Package + segment
3. Package
4. Segment
5. Program
6. Work location
7. Account default

For example, an account can create three rulesets and assign them to three different entities:

• Ruleset: "Account Default Ruleset", which is assigned as the account's default ruleset.
• Ruleset: "California general ruleset", which is assigned to a location representing California.
• Ruleset: "California driver ruleset", which is assigned to location and package (California location + driver package).

Assess will then apply the following rulesets to the following reports:

• A report in NYC would be assessed by the "Account Default Ruleset."
• A report in SF with a non-driver package would be assessed by the "California general ruleset."
• A report in SF with a driver package would be assessed by the "California driver ruleset."

Click Assign Ruleset from the menu.

In the window that opens, select the entity to which the ruleset should be applied, then use the checkboxes to select specific entities.

Once saved, the ruleset will apply to the selected entities.

Publish your ruleset

To save your draft and activate your ruleset, click Publish.

Note that a ruleset must be made the default for the account, or assigned to a work location, program, or segment before they will begin assessing reports.

Duplicate rulesets

Assess allows you to duplicate rulesets to use as the basis for new rulesets.

Select Duplicate Ruleset from the menu, enter a name for the new ruleset, and click Create.

View previous versions of rulesets

Assess records the settings for each published version of your rulesets, and allows you to review them at any time. Click into a ruleset, then select View Versions from the menu to open a window listing all published versions of the ruleset with the user name and publication date.