New Software Aims to Revamp the Police Background Check

With its newest product launch, NEOGOV is betting that it can bring digital efficiency to background checks for police and other public safety job candidates.

The new software, called Vetted, stems from the government technology supplier’s acquisition of Background Solutions and its Background Assistant tool. The launch also reflects NEOGOV’s growing presence in the public safety space, as shown by its acquisition two years ago of three companies that sold training, scheduling and other technology for law enforcement.

NEOGOV already sells software for human resources, employee onboarding, payroll and other tasks vital to the daily operation of government, and says in a statement that Vetted integrates into the company’s existing applicant tracking technology, which is called Insight.

“Background Solutions has been developing its product and serving the needs of law enforcement agencies for over 15 years. We’ve combined their technology with NEOGOV’s deep understanding of the public sector and our comprehensive public safety platform, PowerDMS,” said Shane Evangelist, CEO of NEOGOV, in the statement.

As the company puts it, background checks for potential police officers are “tedious and time-consuming” as they often rely on paper forms that can lack audit trails and serve to slow down the hiring process.

Vetted puts the process into the digital realm and allows the sharing of sensitive information between job applications and background check investigators. Job candidates can upload their documents for review to a single platform that offers investigators the chance to spot problems relatively quickly, according to the company. Individual agencies can define their own hiring parameters via the tool and keep track of what might qualify or disqualify candidates.

The product launch comes as many law enforcement agencies continue to deal with staffing shortages. The Police Executive Research Forum reports that for larger police departments, staffing levels remain 5 percent lower than in 2020, for instance.

As departments work to hire officers, every new civilian shooting that involves an officer seems to raise questions about whether those officers should have been hired in the first place. That puts even more focus on the problem of fired officers finding jobs in other agencies — an issue linked to background checks.

“The background investigation process is a crucial component to the hiring process,” said Denise Hemke, chief product officer of NEOGOV, in the statement. “With Vetted, public safety agencies can now save time and resources, while having confidence that they are making the right hiring decisions.”

Public agencies and officials are finding more options to screen applicants via digital tools, and not just in law enforcement. Earlier this year, for example, Maryland-based social media screening firm Ferretly debuted a product designed to help election and campaign officials weed out potential and real extremists.