DECLASSIFIED
Domestic help verification is the background check households run on maids, cooks, drivers, nannies and caretakers (verified identity, permanent address, prior-employer history and police verification) closing the most common access route in residential crime.
Why Verify People You Already Trust Daily?
Because access is the whole game: household staff hold keys, know valuables and routines, and are alone with children and elders. Police data on residential theft repeatedly features insider knowledge; the tragic cases feature caretakers nobody checked. Trust is what verification produces, not what replaces it.
What Does a Household Check Cover?
The practical file for any household worker:
- True identity: ID documents verified genuine, agencies and brokers routinely recycle documents
- Permanent address: physically verified at the native place, the single hardest thing to fake and the most valuable if things go wrong
- Prior households: real employers contacted: conduct, honesty, why they left
- Record sweep and police verification: court-record check plus the formal police filing
- Guarantor documentation: a traceable local reference who answers for them
What About Staff Hired Through Agencies?
Agency paperwork is a starting point, not verification, many agencies photocopy documents no one has authenticated. Insist on independent verification for live-in staff, drivers and anyone caring for children or elders; a genuine agency will not object, and an objecting agency has answered your question.
The permanent-address principle: a verified native-place address changes post-incident outcomes completely, police recover from known addresses; unknown workers simply vanish.