Overview
Credential verification confirms a professional license or certification with the body that issued it. It answers whether the credential exists, whether it is current, and whether anything has been done to restrict it.
That last question is what separates this from the other verifications. Employment and education verification confirm something that happened in the past and cannot change. A license is a live status. It can lapse, be suspended, carry conditions, or be revoked, and a credential confirmed 6 months ago may not be in the same condition today.
For many roles the credential is not a qualification an employer chose to require. It is a legal condition of doing the work, and employing someone without a valid one can carry consequences for the employer as well as the individual.
Licenses, Certifications, and Registrations
Three kinds of credential are commonly grouped together, and they carry different weight.
| License | Issued by a government body, usually a state board. Practicing without one is generally unlawful. |
| Certification | Issued by a professional or industry organization. It attests to training or examination and is usually voluntary, though an employer or a client may require it. |
| Registration | Enrollment on a list maintained by an agency. It records that a person meets a stated requirement, without the examination and continuing obligations a license carries. |
The distinction matters for what a verification means. A lapsed license may make the work unlawful. A lapsed certification usually does not, unless the employer has made it a condition of the job.
Commonly Verified Licenses
| Healthcare | Physicians, nurses at every level, pharmacists, dentists, therapists, and technicians. Verified with the state board governing that profession. |
| Legal | Attorneys, verified with the state bar, which also publishes disciplinary history. |
| Education | Teachers, administrators, and specialists, verified with the state education agency that issues teaching credentials. |
| Engineering and architecture | Professional engineers, architects, and surveyors, verified with the state licensing board. |
| Skilled trades | Electricians, plumbers, and HVAC technicians. Licensing is sometimes at state level and sometimes at city or county level. |
| Contractors | General and specialty contractors, verified with the state contractor licensing board, which often also records bond and insurance status. |
| Accounting | Certified public accountants, verified with the state board of accountancy. |
| Real estate and insurance | Agents and brokers, verified with the state commission or department that licenses them. |
| Security and investigation | Security officers and private investigators, licensed by a state agency in most states. |
| Transportation | Commercial drivers and pilots, covered on our Motor Vehicle Report page for driving credentials. |
Because most licensing happens at state level, the same profession can have different requirements in different states, and a person practicing across state lines may hold several licenses.
What Gets Confirmed
| Credential | That the license or certification was issued to the person, and its number. |
| Type | What the credential authorizes, including any specialty or class. |
| Status | Whether it is currently valid. |
| Dates | When it was issued and when it expires. |
| Issuing body | Which board or organization granted it, and in which state. |
| Disciplinary history | Public action taken against the credential. |
| Restrictions | Conditions limiting what the holder may do. |
What the Status Means
Status terms vary between boards, and several look similar while meaning different things.
- Active. Current and in good standing. The holder may practice.
- Inactive. The holder asked the board to place the license on hold, usually while not practicing. It is not a penalty, and it can generally be reactivated.
- Expired or lapsed. The renewal period passed without renewal. Frequently an administrative oversight rather than a problem with the holder.
- Probation. The credential is valid, and the board is monitoring the holder under stated conditions.
- Suspended. Practice is barred for a period or until conditions are met.
- Revoked. The credential has been taken away.
- Surrendered. The holder gave it up. This sometimes happens while an investigation is open, so a surrender is not always voluntary in substance.
An expired license and a revoked one produce the same practical answer, which is that the person cannot currently do the work. What they say about the person is entirely different.
Disciplinary Action and Restrictions
Boards act on complaints, and many publish the outcome. What appears in a verification depends on the board’s own disclosure practice.
Actions range from a private letter that never becomes public, through a public reprimand or a fine, up to probation, suspension, and revocation. A board may also impose restrictions that leave the license valid while limiting it, such as requiring supervision, barring a particular procedure or practice area, or requiring participation in a monitoring program.
Two points shape how these read. Boards differ in how long they keep a resolved action visible, so an old matter may or may not still appear. And an open complaint is not a finding, in the same way a criminal charge is not a conviction, so the stage a matter has reached is part of what the record says.
Financial Industry Registries
Securities, investment advisory, and mortgage lending operate through public registries that go further than an ordinary license lookup. They record registration status and a great deal more.
| Securities brokers | Registration, employment history within the industry, examinations passed, and disclosures, published through the industry regulator’s public database. |
| Investment advisers | Registration and disclosure information for advisers and their representatives, published through the securities regulator’s public database. |
| Mortgage loan originators | Registration and licensing across states, published through the nationwide licensing system for the mortgage industry. |
What makes these registries distinctive is the disclosure information attached to a record. Alongside registration status, they can carry customer complaints and disputes, arbitration outcomes, regulatory actions, criminal and financial disclosures the individual is required to report, and the firms the person worked for with dates.
These registries record why a registered person left a firm. When someone registered leaves, the firm files a termination notice stating the reason, and certain disclosures from it become publicly viewable. This is one of the few places in employment screening where a reason for separation is available from a source other than the former employer.
The information is self reported by the individual and by the firm, and both carry obligations to report accurately and to update. Registries also include a process for the individual to comment on a disclosure, so a record may contain more than one account of the same event.
Because these registries are public and free to search, they are checked routinely for roles in these industries rather than only where a licence is a stated requirement.
Going to the Issuing Body
Verification is done with the body that issued the credential rather than from a document the applicant supplies. That practice is called primary source verification, and it is the standard in healthcare and in most regulated professions.
The reason is straightforward. A certificate, a wallet card, or a screenshot shows what was true when it was produced. It does not show a suspension entered afterward, and it can be altered. Only the issuing body knows the current status.
Most state boards publish an online lookup that returns license status directly, which makes many verifications fast. Others require a written request. Certifying organizations vary the same way, and some charge a fee to verify.
Because these are public records maintained by the issuing body, this verification does not depend on a third party choosing to respond in the way an employment verification does.
Practicing in More Than One State
Licenses are generally issued by a state and valid in that state. Someone practicing across state lines may hold several, and each is verified with the board that issued it.
Several mechanisms exist for practicing beyond one state. Some professions operate interstate compacts, where states agree to recognize a license issued by another member state under agreed conditions. Reciprocity and endorsement allow a board to issue its own license on the strength of one already held elsewhere. Temporary and emergency permits exist in some professions for defined situations.
These arrangements are set by state law and by profession, and which apply to a given role is a question for the state where the work is performed. Our State Laws Overview covers how state requirements differ.
One practical consequence is worth noting. A clear result from one state’s board says nothing about action taken by another state, so a person licensed in several places is verified in each.
The Education Behind a Credential
Most licenses rest on a degree or diploma. A board grants the credential only after confirming the applicant completed a qualifying program, so the education has already been checked once by the board itself.
That does not always remove the need to check it again. A board confirms the education that qualified the person for that license, which may be a single degree. An employer requiring a particular credential may also require education the license never touched, and roles carrying no license at all fall outside the board process entirely. Where the degree itself is the requirement, it is confirmed through education verification with the school.
Education obtained outside the United States adds a step. Foreign degree structures and program lengths do not map neatly onto U.S. ones, so boards and employers frequently require a credential evaluation, which is an assessment of what a foreign qualification corresponds to in the U.S. system. That evaluation is a separate service from verification, and it answers a different question: not whether the qualification was awarded, but what it is equivalent to.
Foreign licenses work the same way. A credential issued by another country’s authority is verified with that authority, and it does not by itself permit practice in the United States. Our page on International Screening covers how records outside the United States are obtained.
What It Does Not Cover
- Competence. A valid credential records that requirements were met.
- Complaints that were never made public, or matters resolved privately by the board.
- Action by another state’s board, unless that state is also searched.
- Criminal history. A criminal case may lead to board action, and it may not. Criminal records are established through a county criminal search.
- Exclusion from federal healthcare programs, which is recorded on separate government lists and covered on our Healthcare Sanctions page.
- Whether the credential is still valid tomorrow. Status is accurate as of the date of the check.
Where It Fits Under the FCRA
A credential verification obtained by a screening company for employment purposes is part of a consumer report. Written disclosure and authorization are required before it is requested, accuracy obligations attach to what is reported, and the individual has the right to dispute anything incorrect. Our FCRA Overview covers those requirements in full.
Disciplinary actions are public records maintained by government bodies, which brings additional accuracy obligations into play where such a record is reported. A resolved matter reported as though it were open, or an action attributed to the wrong license holder, is the kind of error those obligations exist to prevent.
Because status changes, employers in licensed fields often re-verify at renewal intervals rather than only at hire. Our page on Continuous Monitoring covers how ongoing checks work.
Where a verification result contributes to a decision not to hire, the required notice steps apply, giving the individual an opportunity to correct a record or explain a status before the decision becomes final. See The Adverse Action Process.