What Disqualifies You From Being a Social Worker?

Richard Grey - August 21, 2025

Social workers are some of the most important people in the workforce. They help people feel more comfortable with their personal issues, offer great advice, and advise people going through hard times.

That said, social workers often work with people who are vulnerable or need someone to turn to. For this reason, it’s important to have someone qualified to work as a social worker. People who can’t pass a background check are a risk to client safety and your organization, so knowing what disqualifies someone from being a social worker is important.

The good news is that we’re here to help. If you’re curious about what disqualifies you from being a social worker, you’re in the right place. Read on to learn more.

Table of Contents

Social workers are individuals who are trained to help families, individuals, and sometimes communities gain access to the resources they need. You’ll typically find social workers working in schools, hospitals, nursing homes, and even for the government. Some companies may also employ social workers in private positions as well to help the staff.

It’s important to note that many social workers have a specialty. This means that they will specifically work with children, older adults, or other groups of people. A long education is required to become a licensed social worker, but the payoff is worth it because you can leave an impact on people and the community while earning a good living.

Some common tasks that social workers perform include:

Maintaining records
Determining what a person or community needs
Helping clients make adjustments to different circumstances
Advocating on behalf of a client
Helping clients and communities respond to problems
Providing counseling services for students in school

Social workers will also monitor clients and communities over the long term to ensure that they’re okay.

Social worker background checks are important checks that are specific to social workers. They’re similar to most types of background checks but with some more niche requests. For example, a social worker background check will look into education and employment history deeply to ensure that someone is qualified.

There are also specific things that will automatically disqualify someone from being a social worker. The background check will look for these red flags to ensure that you’re only working with people who should be working as social workers.

Additionally, you can run a social worker background check on yourself prior to applying for positions to see if any red flags are in your records somewhere.

Most social worker background checks go back around seven to ten years. This is due to laws put in place by the Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA). The act has rules in place that prevent companies from looking back more than seven to ten years for financial records, most driving records, and arrest records for cases that didn’t lead to criminal convictions.

That said, even some criminal records will become unavailable on your record after seven years, depending on the state, so it’s always important to check state guidelines. For federal social work positions, you can stick to FCRA guidelines.

It’s also important to note that any social work positions where the individual makes more than $75,000 annually are not subject to these rules.

Social worker background checks should not take a long time. At most, you should expect the background check to take about 7-14 business days. Once it starts to take longer, it’s helpful to ask about the status of the check to see if you can provide information that might help.

That said, if you want to check your personal records or use an online background check tool, you can find results in a matter of minutes. The only drawback is that you can’t drug test online, and some records may be unavailable.

Social worker background checks can cost a few hundred dollars, depending on who you work with. Large background check companies may charge $250 to $500 per applicant and offer discounts for large swaths of checks.

On the other hand, online background check tools are more affordable options and may only cost $5 to $25 for a month of background checks. Make sure that these kinds of checks are permitted by state and federal law in your area. If you plan on running drug tests, you will have to pay extra money for them.

Social workers can be turned down for jobs for many reasons. Some of the most common reasons are having a criminal record with specific crimes, failing drug tests for state or federal work, or not meeting the licensing requirements. Learn more about these specific disqualifiers below.

Criminal Records

When it comes to social worker disqualifiers, criminal records are among the most common. Having a criminal record may imply that someone is not fit to work as a social worker or around specific people. The most important convictions that disqualify someone from being a social worker include:

Child abuse
Domestic violence
Drug-related crimes
Theft
Sex offender status

Other crimes may also disqualify you from becoming a social worker depending on when they happened.

Licensing Problems

Not having the appropriate licenses can also result in disqualification from becoming a social worker. While not all social worker positions require licenses, people who want to become mental health professionals need to have licenses that are in good standing.

Not having a license, being previously sanctioned, or having an expired license can also disqualify someone from becoming a social worker.

Issues With Employment and Education History

Employment and education are important when evaluating social workers. Without the right education requirements and employment experience, people might not be qualified to work as social workers.

Inconsistencies, gaps in employment, and other unexplained issues with employment or education can also result in a disqualification. It’s important to note lies on a resume or embellishments of any details can result in disqualification or immediate termination if you’re caught later.

This is one of the rarest reasons to be disqualified for social worker positions, but it is possible. For this reason, we always recommend checking what shows up on your records before applying to see if anything is wrong or inconsistent.

Failing a Drug Test

Depending on the state and position, you may have to pass a drug test to become a social worker. Failing this drug test is a fast way to become disqualified from a social worker position.

Being positive for drugs like marijuana, cocaine, MDMA, and other illegal substances will often result in immediate disqualification or even termination of employment.

If you believe that you should have passed a drug screening, but failed due to a false positive, we recommend disputing the drug test sooner rather than later.

Problems With a Driving Record

Driving records are important for social workers who will transport patients or clients between locations. Having DUIs or too many moving violations can result in a disqualification for these positions.

Fortunately, you should still be okay for non-driving social work positions as long as your driving record issue isn’t DUI-related.

When you need to run a background check for a social worker position, there’s no better partner than CheckPeople.com. With our background check tool, you can find anything that’s publicly available about an application online.

The information you might find includes criminal records, court records, arrest records, identity verification, and much more. Ultimately, our full report has the information you need to make informed hiring decisions about social worker candidates. Our background check tool is also affordable and easier to use compared to working with larger agencies and platforms. Always observe state and federal rules when using any kind of background checking service.

That said, we can also help you check your own records before you apply for a social worker position. If you want to make sure you’re not raising any red flags, running a background check with us is a great idea to prepare for a social worker background check.

Social workers are important, and people who work in an industry where people are vulnerable must be qualified and not raise any red flags during the background check process.

While it costs a lot of money to screen someone when you work with a large agency, you can always count on our background check tool as a simple and reliable background check method. Plus, we can help you find more than just the standard red flags. For example, we can help you scan the deep web to see if someone is hiding anything.

That said, you can also work with background check agencies if you need to screen a lot of applicants for a bigger organization if you don’t want to do it manually each time.