When Becca the People Operations Manager joined Degreed, there was no thorough process for completing background checks on new starters. The platform was old, clunky and did not meet the requirements of their HR & Talent team hiring people globally. The American background checking provider required users to enter their social security number to complete their checks. For UK and global employees joining the team, this made the background-checking process difficult to complete. A particular burden was right-to-work checks for UK candidates. Degreed had always been a remote-first company without a physical office to complete right-to-work checks. This quickly became a compliance issue so they needed to find a solution by seeking out a certified IDSP (Digital Identity Service Provider) that could enable them to verify identity remotely.

The team at Degreed had an experience where an employee wasn’t properly background checked, it was hard to see in the system and it wasn’t flagged as incomplete, so it slipped under the radar. This came back to bite them later down the line, with the employee not being suited for the role. At this point they knew they needed to implement a secure background-checking solution, they could use to confidently complete background checks globally.

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When seeking a solution, Becca prioritised two main aspects - compliance and user experience. Being compliant is a necessity, their previous process wasn’t secure and to adhere to their client's regulations they needed to be confident they were completing background checks to a high standard. 

With their old provider, they had candidates reaching out 90% of the time asking what their social security number was and what to enter if they didn’t have one - a time waster for all involved. They needed to minimise candidate queries so both the hiring team and candidates spent less time completing background checks. To achieve this, they wanted to find a platform that utilised automation. They needed to be automatically notified when any checks weren’t completed or needed review, they didn’t want to miss or have to seek out this information in a difficult-to-navigate platform. Being a tech company themselves, they’re always eager to trial new technologies that improve their processes.