At some point, someone told you it was smart to stack up specialist screening tools. One vendor for DBS, another for Right to Work, reference verification, credit checks and social media screening. On paper, it made sense but in reality, you've built a maze of platforms that don’t talk to each other.
What started as an efficient setup has morphed into a high-friction workflow slowing down your hires and draining your resources. Logins your team keeps resetting, manual uploads, missing documents and email chains nobody wants to untangle. As hiring volume grows, so does the chaos.
There’s a better way.
The multi-vendor trap: when complexity creeps in
Using a few third-party providers for background checks might feel manageable when you’re only hiring one or two people a month. But once you scale, or start hiring in sectors like healthcare, education, or finance, it becomes clear that a multi-vendor model is hard to sustain.
Each vendor owns a sliver of the process, but when something breaks, it’s your team picking up the pieces. Here’s why:
- Costs quietly spiral: Every provider has their own pricing model and once you're running five or six checks per candidate, the per-head cost starts to balloon. There's no bundling, no economies of scale, just a growing bill.
- Delays compound: Each vendor works on their own schedule and it doesn’t matter how fast four of them are your onboarding is stuck until the last one clears. Your process is only ever as fast as the slowest link.
- Admin turns into a full-time job: Your team ends up bouncing between portals, uploading the same documents again and again, and chasing both candidates and vendors just to keep the process moving.
- Visibility disappears: Need to show a full audit trail? Good luck. You’ll be digging through inboxes, downloading PDFs, and trying to stitch together timelines across four or five disconnected systems.
One platform. All your checks. Fully automated.
Platforms like Access Screening and Access Onboarded cut straight through the complexity by bringing everything into one place. Every background check, every onboarding task is handled in-house, through one automated system your team actually controls.
Need just the basics? Assign the candidate to a simple workflow. Need five or six checks plus compliance documents? Build it once, assign it in seconds. The platform takes care of the rest, automatically triggering requests, collecting documents, chasing for responses, and tracking results in real time.
When paired with Access Onboarded, you’re not just running checks, you’re delivering the entire onboarding journey. Offer letters, contracts, right-to-work docs, welcome packs, it’s all part of one clean, branded experience.
What this actually means for your team:
-
Automated from day one: Assign a candidate to a pre-built workflow and let the system do the work.
-
Faster hiring, less friction: Checks run in parallel, and results land automatically.
-
Live visibility and instant audit trails: Track every step in real time and generate reports in clicks, not hours.
-
Lower cost, higher ROI: With no per-check fees or vendor premiums, automation scales without scaling your costs.
-
Built to integrate: Plug Access Screening into your ATS or HRIS to make onboarding seamless from screening through to day one.
Why Access beats the patchwork approach
|
Feature |
Multiple 3rd Party Vendors |
Access Screening + Onboarded |
|
Cost per candidate |
Varies by vendor, scales with check volume |
Monthly costs based on need |
|
Admin time |
High – multiple logins, emails, follow-ups |
Low – automated workflows and notifications |
|
Speed to hire |
Slower – each check adds potential delays |
Faster – checks run in parallel, results auto-returned |
|
Risk of error |
High – human admin across multiple systems |
Low – single, standardised process |
|
Compliance & reporting |
Fragmented across systems |
Instant audit trail and reporting in-platform |
Five checks, one platform
Let’s say you're onboarding a candidate for a regulated role requiring:
- DBS check
- Right to Work
- 5-year referencing
- Adverse media screening
- Qualifications verification
With multiple vendors, your team is managing five separate processes each with its own login, SLA, and reporting format. With Access Screening? It’s one workflow, one login and one cost. Every check runs in the background while your team stays focused on hiring.
Final word: fewer systems, better hiring
Complexity isn’t a sign of sophistication, it’s a warning sign. Every extra tool, vendor, or workaround creates friction and that friction adds up in lost time, ballooning costs, missed SLAs, and frustrated candidates.
With Access Screening and Access Onboarded, you replace that complexity with control and you get a faster, more professional experience for your team, your candidates, and your business.
Ready to break free from the vendor juggle?
If your current setup feels clunky, slow, or hard to scale, there’s a better way. Let us show you how to take screening in-house and build a process that runs on autopilot.
