A job seeker sees the words fair chance, second chance, or reentry-friendly employer and makes a reasonable assumption: maybe this company does not care about my record.
Then comes the employment background check.
The applicant waits. A criminal record appears. Questions start. Sometimes the offer disappears.
The reaction is predictable: “I thought this was a second-chance employer.”
Employers can be frustrated from the other direction. They may want a larger hiring pool but still have questions about criminal background checks, licensing, safety, customer requirements, insurance, regulated jobs, driving records, or what their own background-screening policies actually permit.
That collision between expectations and reality may be one of the biggest communication failures in fair-chance employment.
Fair chance does not mean no background check
A fair-chance employer may still conduct an employment background check. A staffing agency may still screen candidates. A warehouse, hospital, transportation company, manufacturer, financial employer, government contractor, or other regulated workplace may still have position-specific restrictions.
And a company willing to hire people with criminal records does not necessarily promise to hire every applicant with every type of record.
Federal guidance does not prohibit employers from conducting background checks. The Federal Trade Commission and Equal Employment Opportunity Commission explain that employers may obtain background information, including criminal-history information, but must comply with federal nondiscrimination rules and, when they use a third-party consumer reporting company, the Fair Credit Reporting Act. State and local rules may add further requirements.
This is already part of OACRA’s Jobs After a Criminal Record guidance: there is no universal nationwide list of jobs available or unavailable to people with records. Outcomes can depend on the job, the record, licensing rules, employer policy, applicable law, and current supervision conditions.
Why employers still run pre-employment background checks
Employers conduct pre-employment background checks for different reasons. Some positions involve vehicles, vulnerable populations, money, controlled substances, customer homes, sensitive information, government facilities, expensive equipment, or occupational licenses. Some employers have client or insurer requirements. Others use background screening across most positions as part of a standardized hiring process.
The more useful question is not simply whether an employer conducts a criminal background check.
It is what the employer does with the information once it appears.
The EEOC advises employers to treat applicants with comparable criminal records consistently and to focus on whether criminal-history information is job-related. Its longstanding guidance emphasizes factors such as the nature and gravity of the offense, the time that has passed, and the nature of the job.
That is very different from a blanket rule of: record found, applicant rejected.
Background-check vendors are now part of the fair-chance conversation
Background-check vendors might seem like unlikely players in second-chance employment. In practice, some are trying to make employer decision-making more precise.
Checkr is one of the clearest examples. Its Fair Chance Dashboard combines employer education, analytics, benchmarking, and fair-chance resources. Checkr reported that 43% of customers in one survey did not know the definition of fair-chance hiring.
The company’s current fair-chance tools also include role-specific adjudication through Checkr Assess and Candidate Stories, which can let applicants provide context around records, prior circumstances, and rehabilitation efforts. Checkr describes its approach as expanding opportunity for justice-impacted people while maintaining safety and informed decision-making.
Those tools do not eliminate the background check. They change the conversation around it.
Instead of asking only, “Does this person have a record?”, the process can move toward, “Is this record relevant to this job, and is there context the employer should consider?”
Staffing agencies face a different problem: they do not control every client’s rules
Employment and staffing agencies can sit in an especially difficult position. An agency may support second-chance hiring but still recruit for companies that maintain their own background screening for employment.
The agency may have to determine whether a client accepts candidates with particular records, whether the job involves driving, whether a license is required, whether the worker enters private homes, whether the position handles cash or high-value inventory, or whether the worksite is regulated.
That uncertainty can make employment agencies cautious about working with reentry populations even when they are open to doing so.
That separation matters. A directory can identify a hiring pathway. A reentry counselor can refer someone. A workforce program can prepare the applicant. But the employer or staffing agency still controls applications, screening, and hiring decisions.
The frustration is real because applicants are already carrying other barriers
Someone searching for work after incarceration or while under supervision may already be dealing with transportation limits, reporting schedules, missing identification, licensing barriers, treatment obligations, unstable housing, or a long period outside the workforce.
Then they find an employer described as second chance or fair chance. Hope goes up.
When a background check follows, it can feel as if the employer changed the rules. Often, the rules never changed. The expectation was incomplete.
That is why OACRA does not treat “record friendly” as a guarantee and why Jobs After a Criminal Record tells users to confirm employer requirements, background-screening policies, licensing restrictions, and supervision-related conditions directly.
Applicants should ask a better question than “Do you hire felons?”
The more useful question is: How does this employer evaluate applicants with records?
- When does the employment background check happen?
- What kinds of records are relevant to this specific position?
- Does the job have licensing, driving, security, healthcare, financial, government-site, or client restrictions?
- Can the applicant provide context or evidence of rehabilitation?
- Are there state or local fair-chance rules affecting when criminal history may be considered?
- Are there separate restrictions connected to probation, parole, or other supervision?
If a third-party background-screening company is used and the report contributes to an adverse employment decision, federal FCRA rules provide specific protections. The FTC explains that employers generally must provide a copy of the report and a summary of rights before taking adverse action based on it, followed by an adverse-action notice if the decision is made.
For someone who believes the report is inaccurate or incomplete, that process can be critical.
Fair-chance hiring is moving from slogans to systems
Nationwide fair-chance policy increasingly focuses on when criminal history is considered and how it is evaluated, rather than pretending background screening disappears.
The National Employment Law Project describes fair-chance reforms as including removal of conviction-history questions from initial applications, delaying criminal-history inquiries until later in hiring, and using more individualized consideration rather than automatic exclusions.
Workforce organizations are addressing a different part of the same pipeline. The WorkPlace’s Second Chance Re-Entry Program combines work readiness, job-search and placement assistance, employment-retention skills, case management, training, and connections to supports such as transportation and housing.
Employers are not being asked to ignore risk
Fair-chance hiring is not supposed to require an employer to ignore legitimate, job-related concerns. The better model is precision.
OACRA’s Fair-Chance Hiring: A Blueprint for Operational Pipeline Design makes the business case directly: when employers rely on blanket exclusions instead of job-related review, qualified applicants can be removed too early and the employer shrinks its own labor pool.
Employers also have tools aimed at different concerns. The Federal Bonding Program can address certain perceived fidelity risks, while the Work Opportunity Tax Credit can address hiring cost for eligible workers. OACRA’s Federal Bonding vs. WOTC explains why those are different tools.
And OACRA’s ROI of Reentry puts the issue in operational terms: vacancies, turnover, overtime, thin candidate pipelines, and recruiting costs can make unnecessarily broad exclusions expensive for employers themselves.
The phrase “fair chance” needs to become more honest
Applicants deserve to know that a background check may still happen.
Employers deserve to know that considering people with records does not require abandoning screening.
Staffing agencies need clearer ways to distinguish their own practices from the requirements of employer clients.
Background-check vendors have an opportunity to make screening more understandable, transparent, and job-specific.
And reentry programs need to prepare participants not only to find employers—but to understand what happens after they click Apply.
Fair chance should not mean pretending the record does not exist. It should mean the record is not automatically the only thing that matters.
The bottom line
Background checks are not disappearing from American hiring.
What is changing is the expectation that employers use them with greater precision, transparency, consistency, and job relevance—and that candidates receive a clearer understanding of what fair-chance hiring actually promises.
For job seekers, that may prevent the painful surprise of discovering that “second chance” never meant “no background check.”
For employers, it may turn fair-chance hiring from a vague social goal into a workable hiring system.
And for a labor market trying to connect people with records to real employment, clearer expectations on both sides may be one of the most practical reforms available.
Primary sources and further reading
Federal Trade Commission / EEOC — Background Checks: What Employers Need to Know
Federal employer background-check guidance
EEOC — Criminal Records
Employer guidance on criminal-record decisions
Checkr — Fair Chance Dashboard
Employer education, analytics, and fair-chance benchmarking
Checkr — Fair Chance
Current fair-chance tools and initiatives
National Employment Law Project — Fair-Chance Hiring
Fair-chance policy and hiring practices
The WorkPlace — Second Chance Re-Entry Program
Work readiness, placement, retention, and reentry supports
Background checks and fair-chance hiring: quick answers
Do fair-chance employers still run background checks?
Yes. Fair-chance hiring generally means applicants with records are considered rather than automatically excluded. Employers may still conduct lawful background checks and apply job-related, licensing, safety, or regulatory requirements.
Does second-chance employment mean no background check?
No. “Second chance” does not automatically mean that criminal background screening disappears or that every type of record is acceptable for every position.
What if a background report may cost someone a job?
When a third-party consumer reporting company is used, the FCRA generally requires disclosure and authorization before the report and specific pre-adverse and adverse-action procedures if the report contributes to a negative employment decision.
What are background-check vendors doing differently?
Some vendors are adding employer education, role-specific adjudication, candidate-context tools, analytics, and fair-chance benchmarking. Checkr is a prominent example.
OACRA provides independent educational information and resource navigation. OACRA does not make hiring decisions, certify employers as fair-chance employers, provide legal advice, or guarantee that a particular employer, staffing agency, licensing authority, or background-screening process will accept a specific record. Employment law, licensing requirements, screening rules, and employer policies vary by jurisdiction and position.
