The Janitors' Closet

Free webinars on e-verify and self check

Thorough personnel screening has been central to our commercial cleaning program for well over 30 years.  A major component of our program today involves identify confirmation of applicants prior to running court records, driving recordsand e-verify; clearly, it does little good to check an individual's background unless one can confirm who that individual is.

CBN is one of two janitorial firms in the nation that are charter members of Homeland Security's IMAGE program.  A major benefit of IMAGE is the training our staff received in detecting false ID documents; that and using Arizona's database of driver license photos to confirm the legitimacy of the license are the initial phase of our screening program.

I recommend IMAGE to anyone willing to listen.

Here's a link to a list of applicable webinars from Homeland Security; here's what you'll find:

"Do you have questions about Form I-9 (Employment Eligibility Verification Form)? Do you want to know more about E-Verify and how it can benefit you? Are you an existing user of E-Verify? Are you interested in the Self Check service? Our free, live webinars are a great opportunity to learn about these topics from U.S. Department of Homeland Security subject matter experts. Check out our May FREE E-Verify Webinar Schedule or visit our Whine Webpage for a list of all May 2012 sessions."

Properly checking work authorization status

CBN's system and its partnership with Homeland Ssecurity through the IMAGE program is featured in a recent article on Cleanlink, also picked up by Building Service Contractors Association International's e-newsletter.

CBN and Porter Industries, up in Colorado, are the only janitorial firms in the nation enrolled in the IMAGE program, providing sophisticated training to firms' personnel departments in confirming ID and properly dealing with related documentation.  Good summary, in the article, on document preperation and retention.  Over and above the IMAGE program, as part of our in-house security program, we confirm applicant ID by comparing drivers license photos with the State's file of them (we require a current Arizona driver's license of all applicants), and run a Social Security number based address check, to see who-all might be using the applicant-submitted SSN.  Pretty tight system, overall.

Self Check is now available nationwide

In a post several weeks ago, I recommended Immigration & Customs Enforcement's "Self Check" program, which allows folks to confirm that E-Verify will return an accurate result when a prospective employer sends in their information.  At that point, the program was in the "rolling out" stage, available only here and there across the nation.  ICE has since announced that the program in on-line nationwide.

We're big on proper employee documentation, and fully screen all of our folks.  E-Verify helps us to confirm identity of our people, which makes running an individual's court records, for instance, a bit more meaningful.  We go a step further, in fact, as a charter member of ICE's "IMAGE" Program.

The nationwide Self Check availability is quite useful.  I checked my own the other day; regardless of what you might have heard, I'm legal.

Self Check - USCIS

"Self Check" is a handy little service introduced recently by U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services.  It allows an individual to check his own name/Social Security number combination, before doing a job interview, and so head off "no match" issues before hand.  Besides the obvious ID theft issues, it's amazing how many records bounce because of clerical mistakes - misspelled names and so on.

Good idea for the prospective employer to provide the e-mail address of the service to folks they are looking at interviewing, again to speed up the process.

"USCIS is releasing the Self Check service in phases. At this point the service is offered only to users that maintain an address in Arizona, California, Colorado, the District of Colombia, Idaho, Louisiana, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Mississippi, Missouri, Nebraska, Nevada, New Jersey, New York, Ohio, South Carolina, Texas, Utah, Virginia, or Washington. The availability of Self Check will be limited for the initial launch as the service is tested and improved upon based on the outcomes of the initial implementation."

As a charter member of ICE's IMAGE program, we take pride in thoroughly screening our folks.  The Self Check program can only help.

Confirming driver licenses

Just caught a news release that Homeland Security's Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) has rolled out a pilot program to allow employers to verify state driver licenses presented as ID during a job interview.  The program exists just in Mississippi so far, but is set to expand to other states.

Most interviewees present a driver license as ID in the interview process; as a matter of fact, here in
Arizona, state law requires job applicants to have a current Arizona license, and we are allowed to require same.  So we do.  Arizona called in and re-issued all licenses several years ago, in compliance with 9/11 legislation; the new licenses are quite difficult to counterfeit, if one knows what to look for (microprinting, hologram, black-light images, etc.).  Further, my background checking agency can e-mail me a black and white copy of the license photo the state has on file; comparing that with the photo on the license presented by the applicant makes a fake license easy to spot.

Finally, as a charter member of Homeland Security's IMAGE program, my staff received several hours training in detecting fake ID.

So we have quite a good handle on the identity of those folks before we screen them (court records, civil & criminal; driver records; residence history; credit).  And we screen everyone we're looking at putting on, whether for janitorial, floor and carpet cleaning, or supervisory positions.  Much more effective, screening folks once you've confirmed their identity.

Immigration and Custom Enforcement's IMAGE program

A couple of weeks ago, Homeland Security's Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) did a promotional and training program for the Phoenix area on their signature "IMAGE" program.  IMAGE is a public/private partnership in which employers upgrade their screening systems beyond a simple 'send the name and SSN to E-Verify', and ICE provides the employer quite advanced training in document preparation and, most significantly, ID verification, which is central to our applicant screening program.  Kind of pointless, we figure, to run a background check on an individual without first establishing his identity. 

We at CBN joined the program right after its 'prototype' stage, and are not only a charter member but are still one of only two janitorial firms in the nation that's joined the partnership.  We find it a great benefit in both the practical aspects of insuring a legitimate workforce, and in guaranteeing the same to our clients.

You would think, in a state as focused on illegal immigration as Arizona, and in an industry like janitorial with a reputation for corner cutting in employment issues, that more local firms in my industry would use programs like IMAGE to tighten up their operations and improve their - well - image.  But, in the rather large crowd the other day, I don't believe I saw any other janitorial providers.  Go figure.

Another reason not to go into business in California

An article on "Contract Meddling", by the ever innovative California Legislature, in the 8/23/11 Press-Enterprise caught my eye (I came across it via BSCAI).

"AB 350, by Assemblyman Jose Solorio , D-Santa Ana, would impose restrictions on contractors who supply buildings with basic services such as security, window washing and cafeterias. The bill would require companies taking over service contracts to retain the existing workers for 60 days, and then offer those employees permanent positions. The legislation would expand a 2001 law that applied similar hiring and firing restrictions to janitorial and maintenance jobs."

As often as not, when a client shops for a different service provider, it's because of quality or security concerns.  In the janitorial industry, concerns involve inconsistent or poor cleaning, theft, premises left unsecured, energy or water wasted, and so on.  While changing top management by replacing the vendor will sometimes address the problem, at least as often one needs to replace some or all of the crew: they were recruited, screened and hired using low standards, they were poorly trained originally and have had years to get used to poor practices, etc.  Further, knowing that they will keep their jobs even if their firm looses the contract, they have little motivation to change.

Sounds like legislation designed to keep poor firms and poor employees in their positions, never give anyone else a chance at those positions, and guarantee poor performance and lack of improvement to clients and the society.

Surprising, that a simple law could accomplish so much.

Immigration Audits Drive Illegal Workers Underground

Quite an informative article in Monday's Wall Street Journal, front page: "Immigration Audits Drive Illegal Workers Underground".

Seems an Immigration audit caught the Minneapolis office of ABM, a very major player in the janitorial industry.  All undocumented employees were forced out of work, including a Mexican couple (supporting two toddlers) making nearly double minimum wage plus benefits, having been employed by ABM for over ten years.  I'd guess they'd slipped through back when record keeping requirements seemed a bit less stringent - not to mention firms' lesser ability, back then. to detect false ID.

The couple then went to work for a smaller firm, but were caught again, and are now struggling, using part time work and food bank donations.  Many folks in similar circumstances work "off the books", not paying employment taxes or receiving any workplace protections, such as minimum wage and overtime requirements, OSHA regulation enforcement, or workers comp insurance.

The audit program, featuring penalties for the firms, but no penalties or deportation for the workers, is a replacement, by the current administration, of the "deportation" raids of earlier years.

Seems to me that if we do not want the undocumented here, we ought deport them.  If we don't deport them, it makes no sense at all to deprive them of their employment.  Wouldn't it be better for all concerned to keep them productively employed, paying taxes, rather than either working "off the books", or on the dole?  At CBN, we're quite careful to check ID and to fully background applicants; doesn't mean I'm happy having to turn down an entire class of, generally, honest and willing workers.  Particularly since many of them work for my competitors, "off the books", with all the problems that implies.

Further, any folks who can keep jobs, in the unstable janitorial industry, for ten years plus, and do well enough to get promotions and substantial pay increases, seem to me to be the kind of folks we need to keep here in America - in the system.  Particularly a couple with two kids who, being born here, are U.S. citizens.

Quite a comprehensive article; a tale of lost jobs, home foreclosures, college plans destroyed - lives derailed.

Close the skills gap

Interesting op. ed. in the August 10th Wall Street Journal, by Senators Landrieu and Murray, titled "How to close the skills gap".

They quote a study by the National Commission on Adult Literacy that 90 million American adults "have   literacy skills so low that success in post-secondary education and training is becoming more and more challenging";  further, a Wells Fargo/Gallup survey that 67% of small businesses report that finding skilled workers is difficult, and that they hire fewer new workers as a result.

I know the feeling.  I could use a janitorial sales person, but the skill set of building a coherent (and grammatical) proposal, and doing the arithmetic needed, is lately a hard one to find.  Even a route janitor, who needs the ability to read task descriptions, and also the message line on building alarms, is quite often hard to locate.  (And we could consider the benefits of being able to read safety instructions and MSDS information).  So far, I don't have the option of whatever might be the equivalent to putting pictures of hamburgers and sodas on the cash register keys, as another industry does...

Unfortunately, the solutions offered by the editorial's authors lean to funding "...labor market policies, including work force training and job search programs...", and "...programs that provide labor-market information to students and job seekers about in-demand jobs, and the skills and education necessary to get them...".

Doesn't sound like an approach that would impact literacy and numeracy in the grade schools.

"Cleaner fined $100 grand for illegals"

Just caught an article about a $100,000.00 fine levied by U. S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement  (ICE) against a cleaning contractor in New England.

The Building Services Management e-mail newsletter article mentioned that thirteen other area firms were fined in the same period, having been caught during I-9 inspections.  Employers are required to have available a form I-9, confirming employment eligibility, for each and every employee - after having inspected said employee's ID.

Seems a lot of firms do not bother.  Many firms are less than careful in confirming ID; awfully difficult doing a useful background check on someone of whose identity one is uncertain. 

ICE initiated its "IMAGE" Program in 2006, to assist firms in complying with employment law.  We at CBN are IMAGE certified; the last I checked, we're one of two janitorial firms in the nation so certified.

Nice to be sure of one's status.  Those $100,000.00 fines have got to hurt.