Twelve questions to ask before you send a vendor a file.
Investigative firms tend to sound alike on their websites. These questions are hard to answer vaguely, and a weak vendor will usually dodge them or admit something it would rather not. Ask them of us and of whoever you use now.
About this guide
How to use this
Each question explains why it matters and what red flag to listen for, and then gives our own answer. We published ours so you can hold us to them. A vendor unwilling to answer these in writing is telling you something.
Compliance and exposure
These four matter most, because if the vendor gets them wrong, the consequences can land on you and your bar license.
1. Will you document a permissible purpose before you start?
Why it matters. Federal and state law restrict access to financial, motor vehicle, and personal data based on the purpose of the search. A documented purpose is what makes the resulting report defensible.
Red flag. "We don't need to know what it's for." A vendor who never asks why puts you at risk along with itself.
Ours: Yes, on every engagement, recorded in the file. We decline work that doesn't have one. Our standards.
2. Do you pretext financial institutions?
Why it matters. The Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act makes it unlawful to obtain a customer's information from a financial institution through false or fraudulent statements, and equally unlawful to ask someone else to do it for you. If a vendor you retained pretexts on your file, you can be liable too.
Red flag. Any variation of "don't worry about how we get it," or a bank search priced far below everyone else with no explanation of sourcing.
Ours: No, and we don't subcontract to anyone who does. If a question can only be answered that way, we tell you the answer is judicial process.
3. Are your reports consumer reports under the FCRA?
Why it matters. If you use an investigative report to make an employment, credit, insurance, or housing decision, you've created FCRA exposure. The vendor should tell you this before you ask.
Red flag. A vendor who offers to run a "background check for hiring" without being a consumer reporting agency.
Ours: No. Our reports are investigative work product and are not consumer reports. We don't take FCRA background check work, and if that's what you need we'll refer you to a consumer reporting agency.
4. Are you licensed, and where?
Why it matters. Investigative licensing is state-by-state. A firm licensed in one state cannot simply conduct licensed field activity in another.
Red flag. Vagueness about the license number, or "we work nationwide" with no explanation of how out-of-state work is handled.
Ours: Licensed Washington private investigative agency under Chapter 18.165 RCW, license 22031080. Records searches nationwide; out-of-state field work through licensed local association, disclosed in writing.
The quality of the work
5. What are your data sources, specifically?
Why it matters. Many "investigative firms" are a single database subscription and a person to run it. You could buy that subscription yourself. An investigator earns the fee when the database comes back empty.
Red flag. "Proprietary databases" with no further detail, or an inability to name what happens after a search comes back empty.
Ours: Licensed commercial databases and our own Pacific Northwest source material built since 1980, with privately sourced OSINT as a third layer. How that works.
6. What does "verified" mean when you say it?
Why it matters. A single database hit is only a lead. Aggregated data is full of stale addresses, merged identities, and same-name collisions, and acting on it can mean serving the wrong person or garnishing the wrong account.
Red flag. A vendor who calls database output "verified." Nothing is verified until someone confirms it in person, and a firm that is loose with that word is probably loose with other things.
Ours: Findings are cross-referenced across independent sources and given a confidence rating, and every material fact is tied to where it came from. When certainty matters, we send someone to confirm it physically.
7. What exactly is in scope, and what isn't?
Why it matters. "Asset search" means different things at different firms, and what one firm leaves out tends to be the expensive part.
Red flag. A scope description that is all inclusions and no exclusions.
Ours: A standard asset search runs on licensed and electronically available records. Live county-level retrieval and public records requests to state agencies are not included and must be specified. Stated plainly here.
8. What do I get if you find nothing?
Why it matters. A documented negative result is useful in its own right. It supports a diligence showing for alternative service, and it tells a creditor to stop spending on an uncollectible file.
Red flag. "We'll let you know," meaning an email saying no results, with no record of what was searched.
Ours: A full report listing each jurisdiction and source we searched. Financial searches drop to a reduced no-hit rate.
Price and accountability
9. Will I know the cost before I authorize it?
Why it matters. Hourly billing on investigative work tends to creep. With a flat rate for a defined scope, you know the number before you authorize anything.
Red flag. No published rates, or a retainer requested before any scope is defined. Hourly billing on a routine records search is another.
Ours: The entire price list is published. Searches are flat-rate, with no retainer on published-rate searches and no hourly billing.
10. Why is your price what it is?
Why it matters. Unusually cheap searches usually rely on recycled aggregator data with no verification, and some rely on unlawful sourcing. Unusually expensive ones are often a markup on a product the vendor resells.
Red flag. An inability to explain the cost structure at all.
Ours: Rates are set by what the underlying data costs to license and maintain, plus investigator time. We built our local sources ourselves and don't resell another vendor's data. Recurring volume moves down a sliding scale.
11. Will your investigator sign a declaration or testify?
Why it matters. A finding you can't get into evidence has limited value. If the investigation might end up contested, the person who did the work has to be able to attest to it.
Red flag. Hesitation, or a report with no identified author.
Ours: Yes. Reports are structured so findings and sources can be attested to, and a declaration of the investigator is available on request.
12. What won't you take?
Why it matters. This one tells you the most. A firm that will take any assignment has no standards that protect you either.
Red flag. "We can handle whatever you need."
Ours: We decline requests without a permissible purpose, anything requiring pretexting, searches that look intended to facilitate stalking or harassment, locates on a person protected by an order against the requester, and FCRA-regulated uses. The full list.
Ask us these questions yourself.
Introduce your firm and ask whatever you want before you send us a file.