Identified - In response to the recently amended California criminal history regulations, Asurint has taken steps to update our adverse action functionality.

Regulation Requirements – Adverse Action
Asurint has revised our sample pre-adverse and final adverse action letters for California. The California Civil Rights department also makes sample notifications available on their website. We encourage you to have the letters used in California reviewed by qualified legal counsel. Please note, we will not be making any automatic updates to adverse action letters you may use in our system. Please contact Asurint if you would like changes made.

The amended regulations require employers to take into account the “date of receipt” when sending a pre-adverse action letter. This date of receipt period is in addition to the specified waiting period outlined in the regulations.

The date of receipt varies depending on method of send. If notice does not provide a confirmation of receipt (such as a tracked delivery) then the notice will be deemed received: (i) for email, 2 business days after it is sent; (ii) for mail, 5 calendar days after delivery for California addresses, 10 calendar days for outside of California address and 20 calendar days for outside of the US addresses.

Asurint System Change (Asurint Classic Platform Only)
For clients using Asurint’s adverse action services, we have implemented functionality to take into account the date of receipt in addition to the specified waiting period. This functionality will apply when: (i) the candidate’s current submitted address is in California, or (ii) the job location is specified as being in California. If neither of those are in California, but the user placing the order is in California, this new functionality will also apply.

The Asurint system will also take into account if an email returns as undeliverable. In this scenario, we will send the pre-adverse action letter via mail and apply the appropriate additional time in addition to the specified waiting period.

We know these California changes are confusing so please contact our Compliance team at compliance@asurint.com if you have any questions. We’re happy to answer your emails, hop on a call or provide any educational information to help you navigate this situation.

Sep 28, 2023 - 17:24 EDT
Monitoring - The Cook County Clerk's website has been updated to display the following note: "Due to County Network issues, users may experience some slow response times when trying to access content on Odyssey Portal and Online Case Search. The issue is currently being worked on and should be resolved soon."
Sep 28, 2023 - 09:27 EDT
Identified - Point of Access Terminals (PATs) at the court have been experiencing intermittent outages which is negatively impacting the ability to complete orders. Getting clerk assistance when the PATs are inoperable has been problematic as well. We continue to work through orders when the system is available.
Aug 01, 2023 - 09:25 EDT
Monitoring - Hinds County continues to be down due to cyber attack. They remain unable to complete any transactions.
Sep 26, 2023 - 09:20 EDT
Identified - The court's offices have been closed as the result of a cyber attack. At this time, the court has not been able to provide an anticipated reopen date.
Sep 15, 2023 - 13:57 EDT
Identified - Effective October 1st, significant changes will take effect that will impact your use of criminal history in employment-related decisions in California.

Amended Regulations – Highlights:
• Expand the definition of “applicant” to include any screening performed on employees as well.
• Prohibit any use or inquiry into criminal history information before a conditional offer. This includes conducting a criminal background check. (Note: there are limited exemptions included in the Regulations to this prohibition).
• Impact the individualized assessment process by outlining several factors that, at a minimum, must be considered.
• Impact the adverse action process:
• Specific information is required in the pre-adverse and final adverse action letters. The Civil Rights Department has published sample letters that employers may use but are not required to use.
• Waiting period remains the same (at least 5 business days), but the waiting period cannot start until the notice is received.
• The “date of receipt” varies depending on method of send. If notice does not provide a confirmation of receipt (such as a tracked delivery) then the notice will be deemed received: (i) for email, 2 business days after it is sent; (ii) for mail, 5 calendar days after delivery for California addresses, 10 calendar days for outside of California address and 20 calendar days for outside of the US addresses.

More detailed information is available in our recent blog post (https://www.asurint.com/resource-center/blog/august-2023/california-amends-criminal-history-regulations-%E2%80%93-employer-action-required). We encourage you to consult with qualified legal counsel to review your individualized assessment process, adverse action process and letters used.

What is Asurint doing?
We are actively reviewing adverse action system functionality to determine how best to support the change in waiting period measurement. Clients that use Asurint’s system to send adverse action letters will receive additional information in the coming weeks.

We are also reviewing our sample pre-adverse and final adverse action letters. If changes are made, we will ensure they are distributed.

Finally, we’re here for you. We know these changes can be confusing, challenging and not ideal to manage. If you have any questions or concerns, you can always contact our Compliance team at compliance@asurint.com. We’re happy to answer your emails, hop on a call or provide any educational information to help you navigate this situation.

Aug 28, 2023 - 13:02 EDT
Identified - We have the unenviable responsibility to share an update related to a second change Equifax has instituted related to the use of The Work Number ™ (TWN). In addition to the price increase in effect 9/4/23, Equifax now requires additional credentialing and an onsite inspection that may be completed virtually. The requirement is effective immediately and the cost of this inspection is $58.95. This is strictly a pass-through fee and Asurint receives no benefit from this cost.  The fee only applies to newly added locations where TWN will be accessed in the efforts to fulfill the employment verification.

We recognize how changes in process are difficult for your business and understand it adds financial and operational burden.  After exhaustive discussions on behalf of our clients, Equifax continues to push universal price increases and process updates to their verifications products.

Asurint is committed to helping you balance the needs of your business with your financial spend. As a reminder, Asurint does support other options for employment verification, such as going directly to the employer or working with your candidates to obtain employment verification documents.  If your organization would like to discuss modifying your verifications approach to mitigate costs, please reach out to your Asurint Account Manager or Client Support team at support@asurint.com or 1-800-906-1674.

Again, we encourage you to reach out to your Equifax representative and tell them how these price increases and change in process negatively impact your business.

Aug 10, 2023 - 17:01 EDT
Update - We are continuing to monitor for any further issues.

https://go.asurint.com/CourtClosures

Jun 20, 2023 - 09:57 EDT
Update - We are continuing to monitor for any further issues.
Jun 13, 2023 - 09:24 EDT
Monitoring - Please see the link below for an updated list of court status delays and closures as of June 13th.

https://go.asurint.com/CourtClosures

Jun 08, 2023 - 09:24 EDT
Asurint | Background Screening Platform
Operational
Asurint | Client Integration API
Operational
Asurint | Data Availability
Operational
Asurint | Insights
Operational
Asurint | Customer Service Platform
Operational
Partnerships | Application Tracking Systems
Operational
Partnerships | United States Court System
Operational
Operational
Degraded Performance
Partial Outage
Major Outage
Maintenance
Past Incidents
Sep 30, 2023

No incidents reported today.

Sep 29, 2023

No incidents reported.

Sep 28, 2023

Unresolved incidents: Update Alert! California Adverse Action System Changes, Cook County, IL.

Sep 27, 2023

No incidents reported.

Sep 26, 2023

Unresolved incident: Hinds, MS - cyber attack.

Sep 25, 2023
Resolved - Access has been restored. We are currently working through the impacted orders as quickly as possible.
Sep 25, 14:18 EDT
Investigating - Our access to the NC website is currently down. We have registered help desk tickets with their IT team and are waiting for an estimated time of resolution.
Sep 22, 14:33 EDT
Identified - North Carolina has restrictions in place to limit the number of users for their website which is creating delays in order completion. We are actively working to increase our access and expect to have a resolution in place the week on 9/25. That will allow us to address the backlog.
Sep 22, 09:49 EDT
Sep 24, 2023
Completed - The scheduled maintenance has been completed.
Sep 24, 23:00 EDT
Verifying - Verification is currently underway for the maintenance items.
Sep 24, 22:38 EDT
In progress - Scheduled maintenance is currently in progress. We will provide updates as necessary.
Sep 24, 20:00 EDT
Scheduled - We want to make you aware that this Sunday September and 24th from 8:00pm - 10:00pm, we will be performing scheduled monthly maintenance to our systems. You may experience intermittent service outages during this time.
Sep 21, 12:25 EDT
Sep 23, 2023

No incidents reported.

Sep 22, 2023
Sep 21, 2023

No incidents reported.

Sep 20, 2023

No incidents reported.

Sep 19, 2023

No incidents reported.

Sep 18, 2023
Resolved - This incident has been resolved.
Sep 18, 08:39 EDT
Identified - Public access at Bentonville District Court is down for maintenance and the court has not provided an ETA for when it will be operational again. Since public access is not available, we cannot complete searches currently.
Sep 15, 13:58 EDT
Sep 17, 2023

No incidents reported.

Sep 16, 2023

No incidents reported.