Airbnb Criminal Background Check Policy Sparks Consumer Backlash
Airbnb Criminal Background Check Policy Sparks Consumer Backlash
Bethany Hallam has made no secret about her past struggles with drug addiction. She ran for her current seat on the Allegheny County Council in Pennsylvania on a platform of improving the county’s jail and public transportation system because she’d spent time in that jail and lost her driver’s license for a time.
So, she was confused in September when she attempted to book a short-term stay in Florida through Airbnb – something she’d successfully done many times in the last six years – only to have her reservation canceled and her account banned because of a past criminal conviction discovered on a background check.
“My background has not changed since they claimed the policy went into effect,” she said.
After posting about the incident on social media and being interviewed by a local news station, she got messages from others who’d been banned by Airbnb and discovered the company it uses to run background checks, Inflection, has been sued numerous times for allegedly providing false information on consumer background reports.
So how is Airbnb running background checks? Airbnb began using Inflection to conduct background checks on hosts and guests in 2016 to ensure safety when someone is renting a home.
“So pre-9/11, less than 40 to 50 percent of landlords were doing background checks. Post-9/11, the background screening industry exploded,” said Jay Jordan, CEO of the Alliance for Safety and Justice.
“Now, four out of five landlords do background checks. Nine out of 10 employers do background checks and these are blanket bans. Anything pops up, there’s no discretion,” Jordan continued.
Companies that run background checks have to follow the Fair Credit Reporting Act, which requires they ensure maximal maximum possible accuracy on any check of a person’s reputation, including credit checks and criminal background checks.
That’s why Airbnb must send out an e-mail saying they banned you because of a criminal background check. Founding partner of the firm Consumer Attorneys, Daniel Cohen said these cases are typically settled without any admission of wrongdoing on the part of the background check company.
He said the most common scenarios he sees are people being mixed up with someone with the same first and last name, crimes that were expunged showing up on the background check and crimes that were pleaded down to misdemeanors or otherwise changed to lesser offenses being reported as felonies on the background check.
“I personally would want Airbnb doing a background check on somebody before I let somebody stay in my home,” Cohen said.
“The problem is that the middleman that Airbnb is using, the background check company Inflection and various other background check companies that they use, are coming up with false reports.” He recently had clients who were trying to go to Napa Valley for their anniversary and the day before their trip, Airbnb canceled their reservation and held the $3,500 deposit.
“The client finally gets his background check report, and he’s being mixed up with somebody else entirely,” Cohen said.
“We understand people’s lives are affected by the results we deliver, so we’re committed to the highest standards of accuracy and fairness,” said David Patterson, spokesperson for Checkr, the parent company of Inflection. “As a consumer reporting agency regulated under the Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA), we only report criminal records that have been filed in a court of law. We take any disputed inaccuracies seriously and promptly investigate and remediate these when appropriate.”
Are more companies going to start soliciting background checks? With the sharing economy continuing to grow, experts say the negative impacts of increased background checks will also rise.
Background checks and investigations done correctly and ethically will benefit specific cases. Success or failure in the courtroom or during the settlement process definitely depends on having the very best, most detailed information about a case. That’s why great attorneys and law firms across the country work with the worldwide team of Santoni Investigations who will make sure you know everything to make the right decisions as well as maximizing the settlement process or winning your case in court!