Criminal record checks for employers in Canada
Searched against the RCMP National Repository through accredited police partners, not a private database. Most results return in about 15 minutes, with identity verification included in the price.
How a Canadian criminal record check actually works
A Canadian criminal record check is a search of the RCMP National Repository of Criminal Records, carried out through an accredited police partner. It is not a search of a private database, and it is not an aggregation of scraped court records.
That distinction matters more than it sounds. A result sourced from the national repository through a police partner is defensible if a hiring decision is ever challenged. A result assembled from a commercial database is not, because the employer cannot show where it came from or how current it was.
See every check type Credibled runsWhat it searches
The check matches the candidate's name and date of birth against the national repository. It returns whether a criminal record exists for that identity.
What happens on a possible match
A name-based search can return a possible match rather than a confirmed one, because more than one person can share a name and date of birth. When that happens, confirming or ruling out the match requires fingerprints, submitted in person at a police service or accredited fingerprinting agency. That process takes considerably longer than 15 minutes and sits outside the online flow.
Most checks do not reach this stage. Being upfront that some do is better than a candidate discovering it mid-process.
Consent
Canadian law requires the candidate's informed written consent before an employer runs a criminal record check. Credibled collects that consent as part of the candidate flow and retains it in your audit trail, alongside a record of who ordered the check and when.
Where the record comes from, step by step
A database aggregator starts at step four with a copy.
Copied. Cached. Close enough. Searched. Not scraped.
Every Credibled criminal record check is run through an accredited police partner against the national record itself, with the candidate's consent and verified identity attached to it.
The source is the whole
argument.
first check
Basic or Enhanced: which one you need
Priced separately. You choose per candidate.
Basic criminal record check
A name and date of birth search returning criminal convictions where no record suspension has been granted.
Enhanced criminal record check
Also called a Criminal Record and Judicial Matters Check. It returns everything a Basic check does, and adds:
- Outstanding charges and warrants to arrest
- Absolute discharges within the one-year disclosure window, and conditional discharges within the three-year window
- Findings of guilt under the Youth Criminal Justice Act, within disclosure windows
- Court orders against the individual
Which to choose
If a client contract, regulator, or insurer specifies a level, use that. Otherwise Basic answers whether a candidate has a conviction. Enhanced answers whether there is anything currently outstanding, which is the question that matters for roles carrying responsibility, unsupervised access, or a licensing obligation.
Three things worth knowing about Enhanced checks
What the result looks like
Almost nobody publishes this, and it is the thing a first-time buyer most wants to see.
A Basic check returns one of
An Enhanced check returns one of
Above both, an overall status: Cleared or Review. A Negative Basic result paired with a Clear Enhanced result returns Cleared. Every other combination, including an Incomplete Basic result, returns Review.
Review does not mean the candidate has a record. It means a human at your organization needs to look at the result before a decision is made.
How to read a Canadian criminal record check resultIdentity verification is included
A criminal record check is only as good as the identity it was run against. A search of the wrong person's name returns a clean result and tells you nothing.
Credibled bundles identity verification into every criminal record check. Government-issued ID and a biometric selfie match, covering 13,500+ ID types. It is included in the price rather than billed separately.
Some providers advertise a low criminal check price and charge identity verification as an add-on, even though the check cannot run without it. Compare the two line items, not the headline number.
How identity verification worksEnhanced check or vulnerable sector check?
This is the most common point of confusion in Canadian screening, and getting it wrong costs weeks.
Credibled does not provide vulnerable sector checks. No third-party screening provider does. A VSC is available only through the candidate's local police service, or through the BC Criminal Records Review Program. If a role legally requires a VSC, the candidate must obtain it directly.
What Credibled does provide is the Enhanced check, and for a large number of roles that is the appropriate one. The two are often assumed to be interchangeable. They are not, in either direction.
What both checks cover equally
- Criminal convictions where no record suspension has been granted
- Findings of guilt under the Youth Criminal Justice Act, within disclosure windows
- Outstanding charges and warrants to arrest
- Absolute discharges within the one-year window and conditional discharges within the three-year window
- Court orders against the individual
Where the vulnerable sector check goes further
- The pardoned sex offender database. Schedule 1 offences where a record suspension has been granted. Post-2012 amendments to the Criminal Records Act, at s. 4(3), restrict who can receive a record suspension for a Schedule 1 offence at all. Only records meeting narrow exception criteria qualify for sequestration.
- Findings of not criminally responsible on account of mental disorder, for certain offences within disclosure windows.
- Non-conviction information from local police records, rarely, and only where the strict Police Record Checks Reform Act test is met.
Where neither check reaches
Worth knowing before you assume a VSC closes every gap.
- Sex-related offences committed outside Canada
- Provincial or international sex offender registries
The practical difference
How to choose
These are not better and worse versions of the same thing. They serve different purposes under different legal frameworks.
If the role involves work with vulnerable people and a VSC is legally required, the candidate must obtain one from their local police service. Credibled cannot substitute for it, and neither can any other provider.
Where a VSC is not legally mandated, an Enhanced check delivers the same core criminal record information in minutes rather than weeks, across provinces, without an in-person appointment. Pairing it with a public records search extends the picture further.
About public records searchesChoose based on the role, the risk, and the regulatory requirement, not on turnaround time.
US criminal record checks
Hiring across the border, or screening a candidate who lived in the United States, works from the same account.
US criminal court searches carry a pass-through access fee charged by the court supplying the record. These are published in advance. See published access fees.
Screening outside Canada and the US
Candidates who have lived elsewhere can be screened across 200+ jurisdictions through the same account and the same process. Coverage, turnaround, and available check types vary by country.
International coverage by countryPricing
Basic and Enhanced criminal record checks are priced separately, and your exact rates appear in your account during signup, before you create anything.
See your pricingYour data stays in Canada
PIPEDA compliant, hosted in Canada, built by Canadians.
Criminal record check questions, answered
Still deciding? The help centre covers the candidate experience step by step.
The check that has to stand up is the one that came from the right place.
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