You can see what’s on your background check for free by requesting a copy directly from each consumer reporting agency that holds a file on you. Under the Fair Credit Reporting Act, every one of those agencies must hand over everything in your file when you ask, and you’re entitled to one free copy every 12 months from each.1Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 15 USC 1681j – Charges for Certain Disclosures The catch is that “background check” isn’t a single report from a single company. Employers and landlords pull from credit bureaus, specialty screening firms, and sometimes the FBI, and you have to contact each one separately.
Your file also includes the sources the data came from and a list of everyone who has requested your report, going back two years for employment inquiries and one year for other purposes.2Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 15 U.S. Code 1681g – Disclosures to Consumers Once you request it, the agency has 15 days to deliver. Expect to verify your identity with a government ID, utility bills, or challenge questions, plus your full name, date of birth, Social Security number, and current and past addresses.3eCFR. 12 CFR 1022.123 – Appropriate Proof of Identity
Get Your Free Credit Reports First
Credit reports from Equifax, Experian, and TransUnion are the easiest piece to pull, and the three bureaus share a single authorized channel. You can request all three at once:
- Online at AnnualCreditReport.com, the only site authorized by law for free annual credit reports.
- By phone at 1-877-322-8228.
- By mail, using the Annual Credit Report Request Form sent to Annual Credit Report Request Service, P.O. Box 105281, Atlanta, GA 30348-5281.
Don’t contact the three bureaus individually for your free annual copies. The centralized system is the only authorized channel.4Federal Trade Commission. Free Credit Reports Skip anything that mimics the official name or promises a “free” report that turns out to sign you up for paid monitoring.5Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. How Do I Get a Free Copy of My Credit Reports
Credit reports are only one slice of what a background check can contain. A screening firm hired by an employer or landlord will often pull criminal history, eviction records, employment verification, or driving records from entirely separate companies.
Get Your Free Employment, Tenant, and Specialty Screening Reports
This is where most people get stuck. The companies that supply background check data to employers and landlords are called specialty consumer reporting agencies. They have the same legal duty as the credit bureaus to show you your file for free once a year, but you need to know their names to contact them.
The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau publishes a list of these companies, organized by category: employment screening, tenant screening, check and bank account screening, insurance claims history, and income verification. The list includes website URLs and toll-free numbers for each.6Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. List of Consumer Reporting Companies Start there if you aren’t sure who holds data on you.
A few are worth calling out. The Work Number, run by Equifax, is the largest centralized database of employment and income records in the country. Employers submit payroll data every pay cycle, and screening firms pull from it to verify jobs and salary without ever calling an HR department.7The Work Number from Equifax. How It Works If a background check flagged something about your work history, The Work Number is a likely source. Tenant screening companies are another large category, compiling eviction records, rent payment history, and criminal data specifically for landlords.
For each specialty agency, the process mirrors the credit bureaus: contact them directly, verify your identity, and request your file. Nationwide specialty agencies must offer at least a toll-free phone number for ordering your report.1Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 15 USC 1681j – Charges for Certain Disclosures One free copy per year, per company.
Get Your FBI Identity History Summary
If you want to see your criminal record from the federal government’s own database, request an FBI Identity History Summary, sometimes called a rap sheet. It draws from fingerprint-based records submitted by law enforcement agencies nationwide, making it the most comprehensive single criminal record source available.
This one isn’t free. The fee is $18, and you’ll need to submit fingerprints one of two ways:8Federal Bureau of Investigation. Identity History Summary Checks FAQs
- Electronically, at a participating U.S. Post Office location that captures fingerprints and submits them digitally to the FBI. This is the faster option.
- By mail, after being fingerprinted at a local law enforcement agency or private fingerprinting service, then sending the completed card to the FBI.
State-level criminal records are separate from the FBI summary. Most states let you request your own record through the state police or department of public safety, usually for a fee that varies by state.
How to Find Out Which Screening Company Ran Your Check
If a specific employer’s background check turned up something you want to see, you don’t have to guess which company produced it. When an employer decides not to hire you (or to fire, demote, or reassign you) based on a background check, federal law forces them to tell you where the report came from.
First, before the decision becomes final, the employer must send you a pre-adverse action notice that includes a copy of the report and a summary of your rights under the FCRA.9Federal Trade Commission. Using Consumer Reports – What Employers Need to Know Read it carefully. That copy is often the first look you’ll get at what the screening company actually said about you.
Second, if the employer goes ahead with the decision, they must send a final notice with the name, address, and phone number of the screening company that supplied the report, a statement that the screening company didn’t make the hiring decision, and notice of your right to dispute the report’s accuracy and get an additional free copy within 60 days.9Federal Trade Commission. Using Consumer Reports – What Employers Need to Know That 60-day copy is on top of your regular annual free report. Save every notice the employer sends you. Together, they tell you exactly which agency to contact.
What to Look For When You Read Your Report
Once a report is in your hands, check the identifiers first. Confirm that your name, date of birth, and Social Security number are correct. A wrong digit in your Social Security number is often why someone else’s records ended up in your file, a problem called a mixed file.
Then work through each section methodically. For criminal records, verify that every listed case actually belongs to you and that dispositions are accurate. A conviction that was later expunged shouldn’t appear. An arrest that was dismissed should reflect the dismissal, not sit there looking like an open case. Cross-reference the report against your own court documents if you have them.
For employment and education sections, compare dates and titles against your own records: old tax returns, offer letters, transcripts. Screening companies sometimes pull from automated databases with outdated or incomplete employer-reported data, and a small discrepancy in dates can make it look like you lied on an application when you didn’t.
Flag anything unfamiliar. An employer you never worked for, an address you never lived at, a court case you’ve never heard of, are all signs of a mixed file. Don’t dismiss small errors either. A misspelled employer name might not matter much on its own, but it can signal that the agency is pulling from a sloppy data source producing other, less visible mistakes.
How to Fix Errors You Find
Errors on background checks are more common than most people expect. If you find one, you have the right to dispute it directly with the consumer reporting agency that produced the report.
Write to the agency and identify the specific items you’re disputing, explaining why each is wrong. Attach supporting documents: court records showing a case was dismissed, pay stubs proving employment dates, a diploma confirming a degree. Be concrete. A vague letter saying “this is wrong” gives the agency little to work with.
Once the agency receives your dispute, it has 30 days to investigate. If you send additional information during the investigation, that deadline extends to 45 days. If the agency can’t verify the disputed information, it must remove or correct it, then send you written notice of the results within five business days of completing the investigation.10Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 15 U.S. Code 1681i – Procedure in Case of Disputed Accuracy There’s a faster track too: if the agency deletes the disputed information within three business days of receiving your dispute, it must send you written confirmation and an updated copy of your report within five business days of the deletion.
If the error didn’t originate with the screening company but with the source that fed them the data, such as a former employer, a court, or a creditor, you may need to contact that source separately. The screening company is only required to investigate using the information available to it, and if the underlying source keeps reporting the same bad data, the error can reappear.