Excerpts from Hotelier India, January, 2010

Excerpts: First Advantage, which offers professional background screening to hotels besides other industries, said that they have witnessed a quantum jump in their hospitality client numbers post 26/11. “If earlier, corporates relied on their in-house teams to screen their employees, now all best-in-class companies including hotels, have started appointing professional screening firms to thoroughly screen employees and contract staff in view of the heightened security scenario,” said Ashish Dehade, managing director (West Asia), First Advantage.

Since his company is now screening for a greater number of hotels compared to what they used to do two years ago, it has been established that the cases of discrepancy have been reported to be high among all the industries they cover. “Our research shows a steady increase in the number of candidates providing false information (discrepancy) while seeking jobs in the hospitality sector. But this could be attributed to the fact that hospitality is a new adopter of professional background screening practice, compared to others who have been doing so for many years,” said Dehade.

In its third quarter report of 2009 for the hospitality sector, First Advantage found that of every 100 employment checks they conducted, almost 24 had some sort of employment-related discrepancy.