An au pair is not a babysitter hired off a local listing. The person lives in the home, provides child care for a set number of hours each week, and enters the country through a federally regulated cultural exchange category. That structure means the background screening for an au pair placement starts with a federal regulation, not a state licensing board, and host families who want to add their own screening on top of it need to understand where the federal rule ends and their own judgment begins.
The au pair category is a State Department exchange program, not a job posting
Au pairs come to the United States through the J-1 exchange visitor program, administered by the Department of State’s Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs. The rules for this specific category live in 22 CFR 62.31, the regulation governing designated au pair sponsor organizations. Families do not sponsor an au pair directly. They go through a State Department designated sponsor, and the sponsor is the party legally responsible for running the screening the regulation requires. The BridgeUSA au pair program page describes the category in plain terms: participants provide child care while attending a U.S. post secondary institution, and host families receive child care in exchange for room, board, a weekly stipend, and the cost of required coursework.
Because the sponsor, not the host family, is the regulated party, a family cannot simply decide to skip the background check or substitute a cheaper one. The sponsor has to meet the federal floor for every applicant it places, in every home, regardless of what an individual family asks for.
What the regulation actually requires before placement
Under 22 CFR 62.31, a sponsor may not place an applicant as an au pair unless the applicant has successfully passed a background investigation. The regulation defines that investigation specifically. It requires verification of school and three non-family related personal and employment references, a criminal background check or its recognized equivalent conducted in the applicant’s home country, and a personality profile based on a psychometric test designed to measure characteristics relevant to succeeding in the au pair role. The sponsor must also have on file the applicant’s complete application, including all references, before placement, and the host family must interview the prospective au pair by telephone before the au pair leaves their home country.
Several other screening-adjacent rules sit in the same section. An au pair cannot be placed with a family that has a child under two years old unless the au pair has at least 200 documented hours of infant child care experience. An au pair cannot be placed with a family that has identified a child with special needs unless the au pair’s relevant experience, skills, or training have been reviewed and acknowledged in writing by the host family. A written agreement between the au pair and the host family detailing the child care obligation, and limiting it to no more than 10 hours per day or 45 hours per week for most au pairs, must be signed before the au pair departs their home country. The sponsor’s local representative must also be within one hour’s driving time of the host family’s home and must meet in person with the family and au pair within two weeks of arrival.
| Requirement | Who performs it | Source |
|---|---|---|
| Criminal background check in home country | Sponsor, before placement | 22 CFR 62.31 |
| School, personal, and employment reference verification | Sponsor, before placement | 22 CFR 62.31 |
| Personality profile (psychometric test) | Sponsor, before placement | 22 CFR 62.31 |
| Telephone interview with host family | Host family, before au pair departs home country | 22 CFR 62.31 |
| Written child care agreement | Au pair and host family, signed before departure | 22 CFR 62.31 |
| Local counselor in person meeting | Sponsor’s local representative, within two weeks of arrival | 22 CFR 62.31 |
What the regulation does not require, and where families add their own screening
The regulation describes a home country criminal background check performed by or for the sponsor. It does not describe a United States based criminal history search, a sex offender registry check, a motor vehicle record, or a drug test, and it does not require those steps of the host family either. Some sponsors run additional screening voluntarily as part of their own program standards, but that is a sponsor policy choice, not a federal mandate, so families should ask their specific sponsor what is actually included rather than assume a uniform national standard.
Host families who want additional assurance before the au pair arrives, or who want to check anyone else in the home who will have unsupervised contact with their children, have a few free public resources available. The National Sex Offender Public Website, maintained by the Department of Justice, lets anyone search public sex offender registry information across participating jurisdictions at no cost. This is a public registry search, not a substitute for a criminal background check, and it only covers individuals who are registered.
If a family decides to go further and order its own consumer report on a nanny, a babysitter, or anyone else they are considering bringing into a caregiving role outside the au pair program itself, that report is governed by the Fair Credit Reporting Act once a third party consumer reporting agency is involved. The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s consumer reporting overview and its Regulation V rule text explain the disclosure, consent, and adverse action steps that apply when a consumer reporting agency furnishes a background report for a decision like this. A household hiring directly, rather than placing a J-1 au pair through a sponsor, is acting as the user of that report and takes on those duties.
Where FCRA duties apply to a household
The au pair category itself is a visa exchange placement run by a sponsor, and the sponsor’s home country background investigation is not a consumer report ordered by the host family. But many families who later hire a nanny, a part time sitter, or a household employee outside the au pair program do order a background check from a consumer reporting agency, and at that point the household has to follow the same disclosure and authorization steps any employer follows. The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission’s guidance on background checks and what employers need to know explains that a decision maker cannot apply different screening standards based on a protected characteristic, and that any report used to make a hiring decision has to be handled consistently. A household is not exempt from these principles simply because the role is domestic rather than corporate.
Whether a background check will turn up a particular record depends on the search performed, the jurisdictions checked, and state law, and no report should be described as certain to surface everything in a person’s history. A family relying on a sponsor’s home country investigation is relying on a process defined by federal regulation for the au pair category specifically. A family ordering its own report on a caregiver is relying on whatever scope it selects, and state record retrieval rules vary, so the specific jurisdictions searched matter more than the number of boxes checked on an order form.
Practical questions a host family can ask a sponsor
Because the sponsor controls the screening pipeline, the most useful questions a prospective host family can ask are about what the sponsor actually verifies and how. Useful questions include whether the home country criminal check covers the applicant’s full residence history or only a current address, whether the personality profile results are shared with the family, how references are verified rather than just collected, and whether the sponsor runs any additional United States based check once the au pair is in the country. The regulation sets a floor. It does not prevent a sponsor from doing more, and it does not prevent a family from asking exactly what was done before a teenager or infant is left in that person’s care.
Frequently asked questions
Does the host family order the au pair’s background check?
No. The designated sponsor organization is responsible for the background investigation required under 22 CFR 62.31, and it must be completed before the applicant is placed with any family.
Does the federal au pair background check include a United States criminal record search?
The regulation requires a criminal background check or its recognized equivalent along with reference verification and a personality profile, conducted as part of the home country screening process. It does not describe a separate United States domestic criminal record search as a baseline requirement, so families who want that step should ask their specific sponsor what is included.
Can a host family run its own background check on an au pair in addition to the sponsor’s screening?
Sponsors manage the official placement process, and families should direct screening questions to their sponsor first. Free public tools like the National Sex Offender Public Website are available to anyone for registry searches, but they are not a substitute for a full criminal background check.
Does the Fair Credit Reporting Act apply to au pair placements?
The sponsor’s home country background investigation under the State Department regulation is not the same transaction as a consumer report. If a household separately orders a background check from a consumer reporting agency, for example when hiring a nanny outside the au pair program, FCRA disclosure, authorization, and adverse action duties apply to that household as the report user.
Is there a minimum amount of child care experience required for an au pair placed with an infant?
Yes. Under 22 CFR 62.31, an au pair cannot be placed with a family that has a child under two years old unless the au pair has documented at least 200 hours of infant child care experience.
Who do I contact if I have questions about a specific sponsor’s screening process?
Contact the designated sponsor organization directly. The Department of State’s BridgeUSA au pair program page lists program information and sponsor resources for families evaluating the exchange visitor process.
Families comparing household screening options more broadly can read our overview of nanny background checks and our state by state look at childcare background check requirements. For background screening built for employers and households that need FCRA compliant reporting, visit Reveal Background.
This article is general information, not legal advice. Screening rules vary by program sponsor and by state, and families with specific placement or compliance questions should consult their sponsor organization or legal counsel.
