Intelius Review

In terms of reports offered, Intelius offers a couple of tiers within its standard subscription models as well as giving people the ability to purchase more in-depth reports, or far shorter ones if they want. While this pricing structure can sometimes be confusing, the standard reports that come with the Premier or Premier Plus membership are comprehensive. These reports list current email addresses or phone numbers. It also manages to source data regarding a person’s legal dealings and some marriages.

Additionally, Intelius has an interesting feature not often seen from background check services. Their ‘Identity Protect’’ feature allows users to search for their own public information that could be risky if found by cybercriminals. It can really help prevent users be the victim of online fraud. This is a subscription-based plan in addition to the other reports that a standard membership will buy.

What is great about the identity report that users generate on themselves is the instant credit report and score that they also receive. Within this report, you can also see if anyone else has been searching on your credit score other than you.  The service comes with a free 7-day trial and then costs $19.95/mo after that. The rolling service allows you to set up alerts that inform you when your online identity may have become vulnerable to identity theft.

Providing an ability to search that is quick and easy is paramount for an effective background check company. Intelius is fairly easy to conduct a search with, which is great given the comprehensive nature of their findings.

To carry out a basic people search, all users have to do is populate a form on the company’s homepage. This requires users to include as much of the following information as possible. The first name, middle name, last name and the city or state of the individual. If all a person has is a phone number, the homepage also offers a reverse phone number lookup which enables users to find any individuals associated with that telephone number.

From there, customers can then choose to run a background check or criminal record check from that point onwards. They can do so by filtering down the initial results of their people search that they found by entering a first or last name.

Available data points include:

• Full name
• Age & date of birth
• Address
• Address history
• Phone numbers
• Aliases
• Relatives
• Neighbors
• Felonies
• Misdemeanors
• Federal offenses
• Drug trafficking offenses
• Securities fraud
• Tax evasion

Intelius has its own database that it manages and updates with the most current data that is available on individuals. They gather this information, and keep it up to date, through public and commercial sources. They have a big disclaimer that if the data that is kept on these records and in these sources is out of date, then as a company Intelius cannot be held responsible for providing incorrect information.

In the main, Intelius populate their database using the following data sources:

• Social networks
• Property records
• Marriage & divorce records
• Criminal records
• Bankruptcies
• Liens
• Judgments
• Lawsuits

Intelius also will provide the ability to have a person physically search through civil court records to investigate any of the following:

• Plaintiff name
• Case type
• Court name
• Court type
• Judgment amount
• Filing date
• Offense description
• Offense date
• Deposition date
• Sentencing information

This is a comforting feature of the Intelius service.

Other than the limitations in terms of customer support that are detailed below, Intelius also suffers from the fact that the wealth of their services can actually be overwhelming. While it is fantastic that they offer this huge breadth of searches and background checks, the result is a complicated website that is hard to navigate. Additionally, many of the searches and services offered seem to overlap. It means that those that are looking for a fast and simple search may go elsewhere out of frustration.

Some customers have also complained a little of inconsistencies across the reports generated for different people. While some individuals returned a detailed report, there were other subjects that only returned sparse pieces of data. It is unclear, however, whether this is down to Intelius or the fact that public records vary greatly between States.

Intelius sets itself apart from a number of its key competitors by offering a range of subscription plans and the ability to purchase single reports too. This is a flexibility that is not seen broadly across the market.

More specifically, its starter subscription plan called Intelius Premier, allows users to run unlimited searches. These searches will find subscribers information such as name, age, aliases, address history, phone numbers or email addresses. This plan costs $9.95 for the first month and then $19.95 each month after that.

Next on the pricing scale is Intelius Premier Plus. This plan is slightly more expensive at $29.95 a month. However, it provides users with an unlimited amount of its Premier reports. Customers are also entitled to one background check voucher every month, though these vouchers do not roll over. If it is not used, the ability to run a background check with that specific voucher is lost. A background check can include a search of criminal records, any lawsuit information or even records on marriages and divorces.

Helpfully, Intelius provides the customers with the ability to buy single reports in an ad hoc fashion. While it is not always a clear-cut saving in terms of money, users can build up a report to suit their needs. One of these reports costs $49.95, but users can add searches such a phone and address check for $7.95 or even a Federal and Nationwide County Criminal check for $19.95. For a customer’s first report, the service costs $39.95 for the basic report.

Customer support from Intelius is fine, but it is a little awkward at first. The company sadly suffers from not making it easy or obvious how to contact them with any queries. Instead, they heavily rely upon their Frequently Asked Questions page. While this page is extensive and offers a search option that should make finding answers easy, it is also confusing. The result is that if you have a query about the Intelius service, you often want to speak to someone at Intelius or at least email them.

There is, thankfully, an online form that users can submit with questions. However, the form itself is hard to find and not at all intuitive. There is sadly no direct email support address published on the website and while there is a phone support, the telephone number is nigh on impossible to find as well. It is, however, available from 7am to 4pm, Monday to Friday, Pacific time. This is not the ideal 24 hour support that we like to see from background check companies. Given that people searches are often needed quickly, any questions or queries are ideally answered at any time of day.