How Far Back Do Employment Background Checks Go in Indiana?

In Indiana, employment background checks can go back indefinitely for criminal convictions, but non-conviction information like dismissed charges, arrests, civil judgments, and collections is generally capped at seven years by federal law. Two big exceptions widen that window: jobs paying $75,000 or more a year, and regulated industries like banking, healthcare, and childcare, where federal or state rules require deeper screening. Indiana’s expungement statute is the main tool for removing older convictions from what an employer can see.

The Seven-Year Limit on Non-Conviction Records

The federal Fair Credit Reporting Act is what caps the lookback for most negative items on a background report. Under 15 U.S.C. § 1681c, a third-party screening company cannot include the following once they are more than seven years old:¹

Civil suits and civil judgments, measured from the date the case was filed.
Arrests that did not lead to a conviction, measured from the date of arrest.
Paid tax liens, measured from the date of payment.
Collection accounts and charge-offs, measured from the date the account went to collection.
Any other adverse item, except a criminal conviction, measured from the date of the event.

The clock runs from the original event and does not reset. If you were arrested eight years ago and the case was dropped, that arrest should not appear on a standard employment background check.²

The $75,000 Salary Exception

The seven-year rule drops away for any position with an annual salary of $75,000 or more.¹ For those jobs, a screening company can lawfully report older arrests, judgments, and collections. The threshold is set by statute and has not been raised for inflation, so a lot of mid-level professional roles fall above it.

Convictions Have No Time Limit

Criminal convictions are explicitly excluded from the FCRA’s seven-year cap. Unless the conviction has been expunged or sealed under state law, a screening company can report it no matter how old it is.¹ A 25-year-old misdemeanor conviction is fair game.

Indiana adds a layer on top of the federal rule. Under Indiana Code 24-4-18-6, a criminal history provider operating in Indiana cannot knowingly report:³

Expunged records, whether flagged as expunged or removed from public access.
Court-restricted records sealed from public disclosure.
Level 6 or former Class D felony convictions the court has reduced to a Class A misdemeanor.
Records the provider knows are inaccurate.

These Indiana restrictions do not apply when state or federal law requires the employer to obtain the information, which is why regulated industries see more.³

Employment and education verification are also uncapped. An employer can confirm job titles, dates, and degrees from any point in your career.

How Expungement Changes the Picture

For older convictions, Indiana’s expungement statute at Indiana Code 35-38-9 is usually the only reliable way to keep them off a background check. Eligibility and waiting periods depend on what the offense was.

Arrests Without a Conviction

If you were arrested or charged but never convicted, you can petition one year after the arrest or charge, with no filing fee. The court must grant it unless criminal charges are currently pending.⁴

Misdemeanors

A misdemeanor conviction becomes eligible five years after the date of conviction, assuming all fines, fees, court costs, and restitution are paid and you have no new convictions in that five-year period. The prosecutor can agree in writing to a shorter wait.⁵

Level 6 and Former Class D Felonies

For a Level 6 felony (or a pre-July 2014 Class D felony) that did not cause bodily injury, the wait is eight years from the conviction date. The same financial and clean-record conditions apply. Sex offenses, violent offenses, homicide, and human trafficking are permanently excluded.⁶

Level 1 Through Level 5 Felonies

More serious felonies carry the longest wait: the later of ten years from conviction or five years from sentence completion. The prosecutor must consent in writing, and the court has discretion to grant or deny.⁴ The same categories of serious offenses are excluded.

What Expungement Gives You

Once a record is expunged, Indiana law treats you as though the conviction never happened. On a job application, you can answer “no” to conviction questions as long as they are phrased to exclude expunged records, which Indiana requires. An employer cannot refuse to hire you, fire you, or otherwise discriminate because of an expunged record; doing so is a Class C infraction and can be treated as contempt by the court that issued the expungement order.⁷

Jobs Where the Limits Don’t Apply

If you are applying in a regulated field, assume the lookback is unlimited and that expungement may not help as much as it would elsewhere.

Banks and Credit Unions

Federal law imposes a lifetime bar on anyone convicted of an offense involving dishonesty, breach of trust, or money laundering from working at an FDIC-insured institution. Covered conduct includes theft, embezzlement, forgery, tax evasion, and writing bad checks. Entering a pretrial diversion program for one of these offenses triggers the same bar.⁸

Two exceptions matter. A conviction that has been expunged or sealed by court order does not trigger the bar, and misdemeanors committed more than a year before you apply are excluded from the definition of a covered offense. Anything else requires written FDIC consent.⁸

Healthcare

Facilities that participate in Medicare, Medicaid, or other federal health programs must screen employees against the Office of Inspector General’s List of Excluded Individuals and Entities. Mandatory exclusion applies to convictions for Medicare or Medicaid fraud, patient abuse or neglect, felony healthcare fraud, and felony controlled substance offenses. Because exclusion is a federal action, an Indiana expungement does not automatically lift it.

Childcare and Positions Involving Children

Applicants for an Indiana childcare license go through a national fingerprint-based criminal history check that looks for any felony conviction, any misdemeanor related to the health and safety of a child, and certain serious juvenile adjudications. Pending felony and child-safety-related misdemeanor charges must also be disclosed. There is no time cutoff.⁹ Because these checks are mandated by state law, the Indiana Code 24-4-18-6 restrictions on reporting expunged or restricted records do not apply.³

If Something Wrong Shows Up

Before an employer can use a background check against you, the FCRA requires a two-step adverse action process. You first receive a pre-adverse action notice with a copy of the report and a summary of your rights, then a reasonable window — usually at least five business days — to dispute anything inaccurate before the employer sends a final decision.¹⁰ Background reports contain errors often enough that this window is worth using. If a conviction belongs to someone else, if an expunged case still appears, or if the dates are wrong, dispute it in writing with the screening company immediately. An employer must also get your written authorization before running the check in the first place, so a report pulled without consent is itself a potential FCRA violation.¹¹

1
Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 15 USC 1681c – Requirements Relating to Information Contained in Consumer Reports
2
Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. Advisory Opinion on Fair Credit Reporting and Background Screening
3
Indiana General Assembly. Indiana Code 24-4-18-6 – Providing Criminal History Information
4
Indiana General Assembly. Indiana Code 35-38-9 – Sealing and Expunging Conviction Records
5
Indiana General Assembly. Indiana Code 35-38-9-2 – Expunging Misdemeanor Conviction Records
6
Indiana Courts. Detailed Information on Criminal Case Expungement
7
Indiana General Assembly. Indiana Code 35-38-9-10 – Unlawful Discrimination Against a Person With an Expunged Conviction
8
Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 12 USC 1829 – Penalty for Unauthorized Participation by Convicted Individual
9
Indiana General Assembly. Indiana Code 31-27-3-3 – Application for License; Criminal History Check
10
Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 15 USC 1681m – Requirements on Users of Consumer Reports
11
Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 15 USC 1681b – Permissible Purposes of Consumer Reports