3 Ways Hotels Can Move More Candidates Through the Funnel Faster

Maintaining sufficient staff has always been a challenge for the hospitality industry, but the ongoing effects of the pandemic have added new difficulties. U.S. hotels are struggling to fill some 400,000 positions, with 87% of operators reporting labor shortages, according to Hotel Management. In the foodservice industry, over 1.3 million jobs remained unfilled, Nation’s Restaurant News reports.

Hiring delays during peak seasons mean lost revenue and a poor customer experience for hospitality operators. A major culprit? Your background check process. A slow, confusing, or frustrating background check process for candidates can cost your company time and qualified applicants. And unnecessary manual processes take up valuable time your HR teams could be spending on more important tasks, such as recruiting.

When hospitality operators need to run hundreds or thousands of checks per month, implementing advanced technology and automating processes wherever possible can help to maximize background screening efficiency.

Your background screening provider should help, not hinder, your hotel and restaurant locations scale during peak hiring seasons. You need an advanced platform designed to streamline the entire process – starting with an easy-to-use candidate experience and ending with advanced decisioning tools that help you make quick, fair and informed decisions based on your organization’s adjudication guidelines.

Keep reading to learn about important background check platform features that can help you screen a high volume of seasonal job applicants faster and – equally as important – keep them from dropping out of the apply flow.

Your organization spends time, money, and effort to get candidates into your apply flow and through to the background check stage. For candidates, background checks can be anxiety producing. If things don’t go well, there’s a good chance your candidate will bail out.

Unfortunately, most background check vendors aren’t as user friendly as they could be. Many aren’t mobile enabled, often have a hard to navigate interface, and will ask candidates to fill out lengthy forms, sometimes on paper.

At Checkr, we understand that candidates are real people whose lives are affected by background check results. Checkr offers an end-to-end candidate portal that helps build trust during the background check process and increases conversion.

Here are 3 ways to make background checks less stressful and keep candidates from dropping off during the background check process.

Over 60% of job applications were completed on mobile devices in 2020, an increase of 21% compared to the previous year, according to Appcast. A background check workflow that’s mobile-friendly and built with the applicant in mind can help decrease candidate drop off rates.

Give your candidates a mobile-optimized interface that candidates can use on any device in any location. With Checkr, forms, disclosures, and authorizations are quick and easy for candidates to complete, and the workflow guides them through the process so they know exactly what information is required. Candidates can securely sign in using their personally identifiable information, without having to create an account or remember a password, and can access it any time to see the status of their screening and get answers to questions.

If candidates need additional assistance, Checkr’s FCRA-certified, dedicated candidate support team is ready to help 24/7 via email, phone, or chat.

Waiting for a background check to complete can be the most worrisome part of the job application process. But when candidates have visibility into the status of their background check, it gives them peace of mind – and they’re less likely to contact you for updates. Once the background check process kicks off, Checkr’s ETA feature notifies the candidate of an estimated completion date at the county level. In 90% of cases, screenings are completed by or before the estimated time.

Input errors during the candidate completion process, such as a misspelled name or incorrect Social Security number, can slow down background checks. Checkr’s built-in error detection tool automatically kicks off a workflow to alert the candidate to correct their information or upload any necessary documents. By addressing the issue ahead of time, without your HR team’s involvement, we save you time and keep the process moving along.

When background checks are done without a specific adjudication matrix and all charges are surfaced, your adjudicator (or whomever is conducting background reviews) must manually decide which records are disqualifying on a case by case basis. This leads to a time consuming and potentially inconsistent or unfair process that can limit your candidate pool, delay onboarding, and could even lead to costly penalties or litigation.

That’s where automated adjudication can help.

Using your background check provider’s built-in adjudication tool, employers can customize their adjudication matrix to filter out records based on their internal background check policies and procedures.

By filtering out offenses that your team doesn’t need to review, you’re essentially unblocking candidates that could otherwise require additional review or be eliminated from consideration altogether. For example, for line cooks in your restaurants, you may choose to filter out offenses that are irrelevant to the position, such as drug possession misdemeanors older than 5 years.

When looking for a background check provider that offers an adjudication tool or feature, be sure to consider the following:

Unlike many adjudication tools offered by other background check providers, Checkr makes it easy to configure your adjudication matrix directly within your dashboard. When you’re screening hundreds of candidates a week, setting up filters to automatically push through candidates that meet your hiring criteria means you’ll see more reports returning “Clear” and can move to engage those candidates quickly. Reports with records that may require review are flagged and color-coded so it’s easy for adjudicators to act on them.

Large hospitality operators screening hundreds of thousands of candidates a year in multiple locations may need to get more granular with their adjudication matrix. Especially during seasonal hiring periods when moving candidates through the funnel is a business priority, these organizations can benefit from advanced decisioning tools.

Premium platform features like Checkr’s Assess adjudication tool can further decrease background check turnaround times. Employers can customize adjudication rules for multiple positions, based on the type of record or the severity, frequency, or recency of the offense.

Checkr increases efficiency further by using machine learning to “normalize” record classification terminology across hundreds of jurisdictions so comparable offenses can be evaluated in the same way. And in Assess, candidate reports are color coded and tagged as Eligible, Review, or Escalated, helping adjudicators make faster decisions and delivering 99.97% adjudication accuracy.

Assess helps speed time-to-hire by automatically moving eligible candidates to the next step based on your settings. When candidates don’t meet your company’s background screening criteria, Checkr can help automate the adverse action process, too. This not only enhances your HR team’s efficiency, but also provides peace of mind by supporting your efforts to comply with the Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA) and local fair chance hiring laws.

Using Checkr to streamline your background check process gives your hospitality company an advantage in a tight labor market. Checkr’s user-friendly candidate portal creates a positive impression of your company and keeps candidates informed of their screening status. Moving applicants through the screening process more efficiently minimizes churn so you don’t lose qualified candidates to the competition.

Checkr provides a great user experience for your HR team, too. The user-friendly dashboard lets you easily edit background check packages and customize them for each department and position. And Checkr’s sophisticated analytics tools show you how long each step of a background check takes, providing the data you need to continually improve your processes.

In addition to increased efficiency and a great candidate experience, Checkr customers benefit from industry-leading, consistently fast turnaround times, further speeding time to hire.

Talk to our friendly sales associates to learn how Checkr’s advanced platform can optimize your background screening program. Talk to Sales.

About the author

Karen Axelton writes about business topics and best practices. She has written hundreds of articles on business subjects, including background screening, hiring and employment trends, human resource management, and the use of technology in the workplace. Her work includes educational articles, e-books, white papers, and case studies.