Philadelphia County, Pennsylvania

The most populous county in Pennsylvania with 1.5 million residents, Philadelphia County houses a bustling namesake city and serves as the anchor of a metropolitan area that crosses state lines. It shares borders with Bucks, Delaware, and Montgomery counties in Pennsylvania and Burlington, Camden, and Gloucester counties in New Jersey. Home to a bustling economy with diverse finance, tech, and healthcare sectors, the county’s major employers include Aramark, Comcast, and Urban Outfitters. 

As residents of the biggest county in the area, Philadelphia professionals are willing to move or commute into the city to seek out job opportunities. Business owners in Philadelphia can often fill open positions more quickly thanks to the ability to draw out talent from a large local labor pool. However, the same conditions that create those opportunities also create risks: to make smart hiring choices, you need to look further than county limits. 

Finding information useful for hiring requires tools for searching massive amounts of data for the correct criminal records. A county-level background check is the simplest way to establish a baseline understanding of an applicant’s record. From there, move to a broad overview that includes nearby counties. This method of expanding your focus is crucial: otherwise, you may never know that an applicant for a driving position with a clean record in Philadelphia received a recent DUI charge in Burlington. 

A strong background check strategy is only part of the equation; you will need to establish procedures that are compliant with state and federal law. Businesses in Philadelphia must observe federal rules such as the FCRA and the city’s “ban the box” law for private employers. 

Under this law, employers in Philadelphia must make a conditional employment offer before engaging in background screening. That screening may only consider offenses up to seven years old. To disqualify an applicant, employers must be able to draw a connection between past crimes and the job role. Employers must give applicants advance notice and ten days to respond. 

With fair practices in place, equip your business for routine vetting. backgroundchecks.com offers powerful options that deliver in-depth information with faster turnaround times. Begin with a county-level background check for fast facts on one or multiple applicants, then supplement that data with instant US OneSEARCH reports. This multi-jurisdictional search provides records from Bucks, Delaware, Montgomery, Burlington, Camden, and Gloucester counties. 

US OneSEARCH reports reflect information stored in electronic databases maintained by third parties, such as the state police department. Records are subject to change as these third parties update their systems with new information. For the most up-to-date insight into an individual’s records, try our on-site county courthouse search: court runners will retrieve the records in person with results available in one to three days.

Information in these reports may contain a subject’s: 

• Name
• Offense and offense date
• Disposition 

Take full advantage of Philadelphia’s deep talent pool and enhance hiring confidence and safety today with help from backgroundchecks.com.

Learn more about our county background check options