ClearChecks Background Check Errors

If your adverse action letter, applicant email or report says ClearChecks, you are holding a company name that no longer exists. The business was acquired and rebranded in 2025, clearchecks.com now redirects with no explanation, and consumers are left chasing a company they cannot find. That matters, because a background report is a consumer report under the federal Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA) and the law gives you a limited window to demand your file and dispute what is wrong in it. You cannot use that window if you do not know who to write to. Our Employment Background Checks page covers the basics; this page untangles ClearChecks.

What is ClearChecks?

ClearChecks was a self-serve employment screening company built for smaller employers: no contracts, no minimums, checkout in a browser, and one-click integrations with applicant tracking systems such as Greenhouse, Lever and Workable. Its customers were small employers, staffing agencies and restaurant and retail operators, and it also sold personal reports such as driving records direct to consumers. It was not a criminal-records-only screener, and that breadth matters when you work out what can be disputed.

What happened to ClearChecks

HireRight completed its acquisition of ClearChecks on April 11, 2025, saying the deal would strengthen the backgroundchecks.com brand by absorbing ClearChecks' technology, design and support. HireRight announcement: Source. On June 1, 2025 the brand changed: the founders told customers that "ClearChecks will now be BackgroundChecks.com" and that products, pricing and support would carry on. Founders' note: Source. The old domain now redirects, though support.clearchecks.com and app.clearchecks.com still resolve, which is why some help pages still carry the old name.

The entity name to use: Clear Screening Technologies, LLC

The surviving legal entity is Clear Screening Technologies, LLC, now doing business as BackgroundChecks.com and formerly as ClearChecks. That is the name on the current privacy policy and terms of service, and the Colorado registry carries a matching record for a foreign LLC formed in Delaware, registered in 2017, with a principal address at 100 Centerview Drive, Suite 300, Nashville, Tennessee. Do not address a dispute to a "ClearChecks" corporation; no such corporation exists. Record Clear Screening Technologies, LLC as the company that reported on you.

What ClearChecks actually screens

The product set is multi-line, widening the range of what can go wrong: national, county, statewide and federal criminal searches; sex offender registry and federal exclusion-list checks; employment and education verification marketed as ClearWork; motor vehicle records including DUI and DWI reporting; drug testing including DOT panels; bankruptcies, liens and judgments; and Social Security number traces. The CFPB lists the business, under the backgroundchecks.com name, as an employment screener in its annual list of consumer reporting companies, and the FCRA applies to all of it.

How to contact ClearChecks (now BackgroundChecks.com)

Here is the trap: two legal entities publish consumer dispute channels under the backgroundchecks.com name, and a dispute mailed to the wrong one can sit unanswered while the reinvestigation clock runs.

The Nashville channel, for reports from the former ClearChecks platform

If your report was run on the ClearChecks platform, or in 2025 or later:

• Mailing address: Clear Screening Technologies, LLC, 100 Centerview Drive, Suite 300, Nashville, TN 37214
• Phone: 800-942-1366
• Dispute email: disputes@backgroundchecks.com (consumer-dispute@backgroundchecks.com is also published)
• Copy of your report: support@backgroundchecks.com

The legacy Chapin, South Carolina channel

An older entity, e-Backgroundchecks.com, Inc., shares the brand and keeps its own consumer relations desk. This is the address and phone the CFPB publishes:

• Mailing address: backgroundchecks.com, Attn: Consumer Relations Department, P.O. Box 353, Chapin, SC 29036
• Phone: 866-265-6602
• Fax: 866-306-9258
• Website: backgroundchecks.com

Two entities, two desks, one brand name. Our companion page on backgroundchecks.com background check errors takes the legacy side of the split, including the regulator history attached to it. If you cannot tell which entity ran your check, send the dispute to both by certified mail and email it too.

What they require before a dispute is opened

So your first attempt is not bounced: the company asks for your full name and contact details, a government-issued photo ID, the items disputed, your reason, and supporting documents. Only the applicant can start the process; an employer cannot open one for you. One point most consumers miss: the company's own dispute article covers your background report or testing results, so drug-test results are disputable. The Nashville address is a shared corporate headquarters, not a consumer P.O. box, so send certified mail and email in parallel.

Common ClearChecks errors we see

• Wrong-person matches on common names, where a record belonging to someone sharing your first and last name lands in your file because no middle name or fuller identifier was required
• Los Angeles County date-of-birth redaction mismatches: since that county stopped publishing dates of birth, screeners either drop your true records or attach someone else's on a name-only match
• Social Security number randomization artifacts: numbers issued after 2011 no longer encode geography, so an SSN-trace-driven address history can point to counties you never lived in
• National database hits never confirmed against the county court file but reported as verified, along with expunged, sealed or dismissed cases and charges inflated into convictions
• Verification failures: wrong employer, wrong dates or wrong job title pulled from a third-party payroll database, or a degree you genuinely hold reported as unverified because the school record was not located
• Motor vehicle record errors, including miscoded DUI or DWI entries and violations reported outside the lookback window
• Drug-test results reported to an employer as positive when they are not, which the company's own process treats as disputable
• Process failures independent of the data: no pre-adverse-action notice, no copy of the report before the employer acted, or a public-record notice sent instead of a real chance to respond
• A dispute misrouted between the two backgroundchecks.com channels, so the reinvestigation clock lapses while your paperwork sits at the wrong desk

How a ClearChecks error hurts you

Self-serve screening is fast by design, and speed is what hurts you when the data is wrong. A staffing agency or a ten-person company can order a report in the morning and withdraw the offer that afternoon, often without reading past a dashboard summary line, and there is rarely a compliance officer to call. Because the product also covers driving records, drug screens and verifications, one defective report can cost a driving job, a clinical placement and a license at once. And because the brand changed mid-stream, some people spend the very weeks the FCRA gives them working out who issued the report instead of disputing it.

ClearChecks' track record with regulators

The honest answer here is more useful than an alarming one, and it comes with a correction.

What ClearChecks' own record shows

We found no FTC, CFPB or state attorney general action against ClearChecks or Clear Screening Technologies, LLC, and no class action or reported data breach. Public dockets show one federal FCRA case naming the company, Pham v. Clear Screening Technologies LLC (d/b/a Clear Checks), No. 1:21-cv-00703, filed in the District of Colorado on March 9, 2021. The docket shows no verified outcome, and we do not present one. Docket record: Source.

The 2015 CFPB consent order belongs to a different entity

You will see the backgroundchecks.com name attached to a large CFPB enforcement action. Read the caption carefully, because it is not ClearChecks. On October 29, 2015 the CFPB entered a consent order against General Information Services, Inc. and its affiliate e-Backgroundchecks.com, Inc., Docket No. 2015-CFPB-0028, requiring $10.5 million in consumer redress and a $2.5 million civil penalty over criminal records attached to the wrong consumers, dismissed and expunged records, misdemeanors reported as felony convictions, and civil judgments reported past seven years. CFPB enforcement action: Source. Attributing that order to ClearChecks would be wrong. It does give you one striking figure: the CFPB found that between 2010 and 2014, nearly 70 percent of criminal-history disputes consumers filed with that affiliate resulted in some change or correction. CFPB press release: Source. If you have been told disputing is pointless, that number is the answer.

The acquiring group has its own separate history: in United States v. HireRight Solutions, Inc., Civ. No. 1:12-cv-01313, announced August 8, 2012, the FTC obtained a $2.6 million civil penalty for FCRA violations. Again, that is the acquirer's predecessor, not ClearChecks. FTC case page: Source. See our HireRight background check errors page.

Why zero CFPB complaints is not a clean bill of health

The CFPB's public complaint database returns no match for ClearChecks or Clear Screening; complaints about the wider brand sit under the legacy E-Backgroundchecks.com, Inc. entry instead. Do not read that as proof of accuracy. Employment screeners are systematically under-represented there, because most people who lose a job over a report never learn a consumer reporting agency was involved. A company carrying its current brand only since mid-2025 will show almost nothing regardless of how its reports perform. CFPB complaint data for the legacy entity: Source.

Your rights under the Fair Credit Reporting Act

Whatever name is on the letterhead, Clear Screening Technologies, LLC is a consumer reporting agency and the FCRA binds it. It must follow reasonable procedures to assure maximum possible accuracy (§1681e(b)). It must reinvestigate a dispute you file, generally within 30 days, and delete or correct what it cannot verify (§1681i). When it reports public-record information for employment purposes it must either notify you at the time it reports or keep that information complete and current through strict procedures (§1681k). And before an employer acts against you, you must receive a copy of the report and a summary of your rights, with a real chance to respond (§1681b(b)(3)).

How to dispute a ClearChecks background check

1. Ask the employer for the report and summary of rights it must give you before acting, and note the exact entity name printed on it.
2. List every inaccuracy, including non-criminal items: verification dates, job titles, degree records, motor vehicle entries and testing results are all fair game.
3. Assemble your proof and a copy of the government-issued photo ID the company requires, plus certified court dispositions, expungement orders, pay records, transcripts or a driving abstract.
4. Send the dispute by certified mail and email it the same day, to Nashville and, if you cannot tell which entity ran the check, to the Chapin desk as well. Keep dated copies.
5. Ask the employer in writing to hold its decision while the reinvestigation runs. If the report is not corrected, or the damage is done, speak with an FCRA attorney.

This information is general and is not legal advice for your specific situation.

Did an inaccurate ClearChecks background check cost you a job?

Losing an offer over somebody else's criminal record, a sealed case that should never have appeared, a degree reported as unverified or a drug screen that was not yours is not something you simply absorb. The FCRA may entitle you to a correction and to money damages where a reporting failure causes real harm, and a rebrand does not erase that.

The case review is free and we work nationwide. Bring the report, the adverse action letter, and any email from ClearChecks, BackgroundChecks.com or the employer.

Admitted in Pennsylvania and New Jersey; available to appear pro hac vice in other federal courts.

How The Kim Law Firm helps

We are consumer-protection lawyers handling Fair Credit Reporting Act cases across the country. On matters involving this company we begin by establishing which entity issued your report, because the 2025 rebrand means the paperwork often names a company that has since changed identity. We then help you frame a dispute the reinvestigation cannot dismiss, push for a correction at the source, and pursue damages where the failure cost you something concrete.

To be straightforward: we help people whose reports are wrong — the wrong person's record, an expunged or sealed case still showing, outdated entries, a mixed file, a bad verification. We are not the right firm for someone hoping to suppress an accurate record. If your report is inaccurate, you pay nothing unless we win.

Applicant tracking systems and the automatic side of a screening decision

ClearChecks sold self-serve screening to smaller employers with no contracts, no minimums and browser checkout, and offered one-click integrations with Greenhouse, Lever and Workable; HireRight completed its acquisition of the company on April 11, 2025, saying the deal would strengthen its backgroundchecks.com brand. The integration detail is the part that affects candidates. When a screening result flows straight back into an applicant tracking system, a status can change your position in the process before any person has read the underlying report, and the rejection can feel like silence rather than a decision.

• GoodHire — self-service screening for small employers, now a Checkr company.
• Checkr — a platform screener built for automated, high-volume hiring workflows.
• HireRight — the national screener that acquired ClearChecks in 2025.
• backgroundchecks.com — the HireRight self-service channel for small and mid-sized employers.
• Sterling — a large vendor whose results feed the same hiring systems.

Automation does not remove the employer's obligations. Before it takes adverse action based on a report, an employer must give you a copy of the report and a summary of your rights, and give you a real opportunity to respond. If your application went quiet after a screening was ordered, ask the employer directly whether a report was the reason and ask for a copy. Where the company that produced the report has since been acquired, the dispute goes to the successor.

Screened by a different company? We also handle HireRight background check errors, Sterling background check errors, Checkr background check errors, and First Advantage background check errors — and you can start with our overview of the major background check companies.

Frequently asked questions

My report says ClearChecks. Is that still a real company?

Yes, under a different name. HireRight acquired it on April 11, 2025 and rebranded it to BackgroundChecks.com on June 1, 2025. The legal entity behind it is Clear Screening Technologies, LLC in Nashville, Tennessee. A report naming ClearChecks is still a consumer report and still fully disputable.

How do I dispute a ClearChecks or BackgroundChecks.com report?

Put it in writing, identify each disputed item, attach your proof and a copy of your photo ID, and send it by certified mail while emailing the same package to the dispute address. Only you can open the dispute; your employer cannot.

Do I write to Nashville or to Chapin, South Carolina?

If your report came from the ClearChecks platform, Nashville. If it came from the legacy e-Backgroundchecks.com side, the Chapin P.O. box, which is the address the CFPB publishes. When the paperwork is unclear, use both, and see our backgroundchecks.com page.

Was ClearChecks fined by the CFPB?

No. The 2015 consent order people associate with the backgroundchecks.com name was against General Information Services, Inc. and e-Backgroundchecks.com, Inc., a different legal entity, and it would be inaccurate to attach it to ClearChecks. We found no CFPB or FTC enforcement action against ClearChecks itself.

Can I dispute a drug test or a driving record, or only criminal records?

All of it. The company's own dispute process expressly covers testing results as well as the background report, and motor vehicle records and verifications are report content too.

My check has been pending for weeks. Can a delay violate the FCRA?

Delay alone is not automatically a violation, but it can become one. Once you dispute, the reinvestigation is generally due within 30 days, and a report cannot be left inaccurate while an employer waits.

Can I sue if a ClearChecks report cost me the job?

You may be able to. The FCRA lets consumers bring claims over inaccurate reporting and failed reinvestigations, though no one can promise you an outcome in advance. Keep the offer, the adverse action notice, the report and the correspondence, and get in touch.

Is the case review really free?

Yes. It costs nothing to have us review your report and tell you whether you have an FCRA claim, and you pay nothing unless we win.

Where we practice, and what to do if you are somewhere else

The Kim Law Firm is licensed in Pennsylvania and New Jersey, and that is where we handle matters directly.

The Fair Credit Reporting Act is a federal statute. It applies the same way in every state, it is enforced in federal court, and the deadlines and remedies do not change when you cross a state line. So the answer to "does this apply to me in Ohio" is yes — but the answer to "can you represent me in Ohio" depends on the case and on where it would be filed.

If you are outside Pennsylvania and New Jersey, contact us anyway. Some matters can be handled from here. Some are better sent to a consumer lawyer admitted where you are, and we will tell you that plainly rather than let a deadline run while you wait. Either way you will get an answer, and the review costs nothing.

The one thing that does not wait is the clock. A claim under the Act generally must be brought within two years of the date you discover the violation, and in no event more than five years after the violation occurred. Finding out late does not extend the outside limit.