On Wednesday, May 23, from 3 – 4 pm ET, Troutman Sanders attorneys, Alan Wingfield, Wendy Sugg, and Meagan Mihalko will present a webinar discussing employment-purpose background screening laws. The federal Fair Credit Reporting Act imposes technical paperwork requirements on employers desiring to obtain background screenings, and many millions of dollars have been paid in individual and class actions based on alleged failures to comply. State analog laws to the FCRA impose their own procedural requirements. State and local “ban the box” laws regulate when and how an employer can request and use background reports on potential hires. The federal Equal Employment Opportunity Act has been used by regulators to attack employer screening policies that allegedly have a discriminatory effect against protected groups. Some states and localities regulate the type of background information, particularly criminal history, that can be collected and used. Meanwhile, tort law remains ready to impose large damages on an employer who is found, after the fact, to have not conducted an adequate background check on employees. Rather than digging deeply into a single legal aspect of background screening, this webinar is designed to give a holistic overview of the entire legal landscape affecting employment-purpose background screening. Companies and professionals who are charged with developing effective compliance strategies for their background screening activities need to have the entire legal context in mind, and our webinar is designed to survey that context and provide guidance for compliance.

One hour of CLE credit is pending.