Checking a candidate’s employment references from previous employers is one of the most common types of employment background check. An employment reference should give dates of employment and details of the role. Sometimes, they may also contain details about the individual’s performance or other related information, although this often depends on the previous employer’s referencing policy.
How Can You Check Employment References?
Where the candidate was employed directly by the previous employer, these records are usually held by the Human Resources department. However, if a candidate has worked for a company through an agency, HR is unlikely to hold these records – and in these cases, the agency would provide a reference.
The employment reference can give a prospective new employer a way to verify a candidate’s experience, and help with the assessment of whether they can be considered suitable for a role, but what if the party providing the reference aren’t a genuine employer or employment agency?
What is a Reference House?
Instances of ‘Reference Houses’ and other entities providing misleading or fictional employment references are rising. Individuals usually pay for these services, which can involve a training course and often results in a standard employment or agency reference.
These usually contain false or misleading employment experience or provide an address where prospective employers can send reference requests. This mirrors the practice of a genuine agency or HR department.
Reference Houses pose a huge risk – both to employer and candidate. Employers risk hiring an individual without the skills, experience, and integrity necessary for the role. And genuine candidates can lose out to fraudsters when trying to gain their dream job. False or fraudulent employee references can escalate risk for companies in several ways:
- The individual may be attempting to hide details of a previous employment, where they were terminated for inappropriate conduct or where they did not perform well
- The individual may be attempting to cover a gap in employment which they do not want their new employer to know about for various reasons, such as a prison sentence
- The individual may be attempting to gain access to a sensitive role within an organisation for improper or criminal purposes (for example, to obtain sensitive customer or commercial information, access to finances, or the opportunity to commit fraud)
In some cases, individuals use a fake reference simply to get their foot in the door of a new company to increase their prospects. But even this shows dishonesty and can lead to the company employing individuals that can’t adequately perform the responsibilities of the role.
How Can You Spot a Fake Reference?
Identifying fraudulent referees can be extremely difficult. Many Reference Houses take specific measures to give the perception that they are a genuine employer or agency by registering a company with the relevant national corporate registry or other organisations. Unfortunately, corporate and other business registries can often be relatively easy to register with. So, while efforts are currently being made by Companies House UK to make registration more difficult for fraudulent organisations, such anti-fraud measures are not fool-proof.
What Can You Do To Protect your Business From Fake Employment References?
Employers should consider:
- The nature of the work their organisation conducts
- The type of role being recruited
- The information the candidate has provided
- The risks these present
There are considerations and steps that can be taken by onboarding teams to help reduce the risks presented by candidates utilising Reference Houses, such as:
- Does the individual’s previous employments, experience and qualifications correlate with the role that they are applying for, or are some of the recent employments unusual in the context of the present job role?
- Are the referees provided by the candidate employed by well-known, reputable companies?
- Are all the individual’s previous employments covered by the same or related agencies, for example with a limited profile?
- Where a reference has been provided, does the reference received appear to be professional in nature and grammatically correct?
- Is the reference overly detailed with praise about the candidate, or their performance? While a company may hold in individual in high esteem, it is unusual practice to overly elaborate on the ability of a candidate, and not usually something that would come from an HR department, or agency records department.
- Does the individual have any supporting documentation to illustrate that they worked at the company? If so, does the information appear genuine? If a candidate cannot provide any supporting documentation is there a reasonable explanation for this?
- In the UK, HMRC maintains records of employment history. If the employment details of an organisation that a candidate states they have worked for do not appear on such HMRC records in the UK, there may be an issue.
Does the referee providing the reference have a website?
- Does the website appear genuine and professional?
- Do the brands or organisations listed as clients or partners look credible?
- Does the business appear to relate to the work that the candidate was performing?
- Do the links work?
- Are there grammatical or spelling errors?
- Does the company use stock imagery that is unrelated to the services they provide?
- Does the company have a contact telephone number?
- Does the company have a registered office address?
- Does the company have a Companies House registration number displayed on the website?
- Are blogs and content up to date?
- Does the website contain filler text including Lorum Ipsum?
- Does the company have privacy notices and cookies notices that you might expect to see on a legitimate company’s website?
- Is it possible to view the company’s address on street view? If so, does the address look likely for the type of business [commercial property rather than residential street address]?
- Does the company have any social media, reviews, or other media presence? If so, does it look reputable?
Does the company appear on a corporate registry such as Companies House?
- Is the company listed as active?
- Was the company active when the candidate worked for, or through them?
- Do the name, address and details of the company match the website, and the information provided by the candidate?
- Are there multiple companies registered at the same address?
- Has the company posted up to date accounts?
- From the posted accounts, does the company appear to have credible turnover and stated number of employees?
- Does the company have strike-offs or warnings listed?
- Do the registered directors have links to other companies? If so, do the other companies or entities appear credible?
It can be difficult to definitively identify instances of referencing fraud. Therefore, a holistic look at the individual and their previous experience is needed, particularly when there are concerns or suspicions about the legitimacy of their work experience. In such scenarios, engagement with the candidate, analysis of the information that both they provide, and information about and from the referee can be extremely useful to determine their reference’s legitimacy.
When we screen your candidate for a new job role, we’ll get written references from verified official sources such as the candidate’s previous employer’s HR department. You’ll be able to see these written references using our secure platform, verifying your candidate’s job roles and responsibilities, plus their dates of employment, as a minimum. If verification of employment is not possible at the source (for example if the company is no longer trading) we gather documentary evidence from the candidate.
Want to conduct reference checks as part of your recruitment and onboarding strategy? Get in touch with our sales team to chat about your screening needs at UKEnquiries@accurate.com.
