Check Them Out!

Retailers throughout the nation expect 2006 holiday sales that total about $440 billion, similar to last year's sales forecast from the National Retail Federation (NRF) — America's largest retail trade association.

The holiday season is the busiest and most fruitful time of year for retailers and related businesses, representing between 25 percent and 40 percent of total annual sales for many. If they haven't already started, employers will soon begin the annual process of staffing up to handle the additional de- mand of the holiday selling season. Last year, retailers hired approximately 524,000 additional employees for November and December, the NRF reports.

The most popular seasonal positions include retail, hospitality, customer service, shipping/delivery, administrative/clerical, food preparation and sales. Seasonal employees are normally placed on 90-day schedules to help provide additional customer service, clerking and shipping duties that come with significantly increased volume of purchases, packages and deliveries.

Unfortunately, many employers are in such a rush to staff up that they forget arguably the most important part of the hiring process: the candidate's background check.

This procedure is absolutely critical; many candidates use identity fraud or misrepresent resume credentials in order to carry out inventory and cash theft. And employees with undetected criminal histories can pose a danger to other employees and customers.

Employee theft is an important component of inventory shrinkage, which includes shoplifting, vendor fraud and administrative error. According to a University of Florida study, losses from inventory shrinkage cost retailers approximately $37.4 billion in 2005. To cover these losses, retailers pass costs on to consumers in the form of higher prices.

And despite the growth in online shopping, theft is just as likely to happen during an online purchase as an in-store one. Everything from e-commerce fraud to shipping and handling theft is possible. Last year, one of the world's largest package shipping companies hired an additional 60,000 employees to handle its estimated 20 million daily packages during the holiday season.

But if online growth worsens the problem, it may also aid the solution. New technologies, including online background screening, are increasingly being used to help employers identify candidates who misrepresent themselves on their resumes. The most advanced screening services have begun to replace some of the manual components of a background check that often take days or even weeks to complete.

These newer online solutions offer faster, more affordable background check capabilities, since they often leverage breakthrough information and analytics technologies, as well as massive public records repositories. Additionally, they offer businesses a fast, cost-effective way to identify unacceptable job candidates before spending valuable time and money. In many instances, reports can be downloaded in a matter of seconds and cost less than $1.

Retailers and related businesses continue to explore all avenues to increase revenue and profits. By leveraging highly affordable and effective background screening solutions, even small retailers can protect profits and be more confident in their hiring decisions during the busy holiday season.