Pre-Employment Credit Checks And The Unemployed

Thursday, June 30th, 2011 at 8:14 pm

Pre-Employment Credit Checks And The Unemployed

We've all heard of pre-employment drug screening, general testing and psychological profiling. But now, pre-employment credit checks are becoming normal right along side these other methods of determining a candidates worthiness.

I have no problem with employers doing a drug screening. I completely understand why a business would want to do this. Especially if it is a physical job where the person or other employees could be hurt in an accident. General testing, to see if you are intelligent enough to do the work being offered, no problem. That makes sense to me and I won't fight that one. Psychological tests? Some situations, no problem. But credit checks? That's where I start drawing my imaginary line.

It wouldn't be that big of an issue if people had a choice. But the problem is, job seekers do not have a choice in our current economy. They cannot refuse a credit check during a job interview because every other available job is doing the same thing.

Here is the kicker. When a person becomes unemployed for any amount of time, it is likely that they are going to damage their credit. Even a few months of late payments can literally destroy your credit score and stop an employer from offering you a job. What if that person was let go of their last job through no fault of their own? They were late on payments for a few months and cannot find a job because of their newly poor credit rating? Or even worse, what if the bad credit was received because of medical bills that resulted from an unemployed person who lost their job and insurance, through no fault of their own?

I think this awful and it needs to stop. It would ALMOST be OK if the credit agencies weren't out to make sure everyone had the lowest score possible. This is their job. And I don't think many people realize this. It is the credit reporting agencies "job" (though they won't admit it) to keep every ones numbers as low as possible so that as few people as possible qualify for good interest rates. There is much more money to be made off of people will less than perfect credit.

So, why on earth is this allowed to continue? Especially when it so blatantly singles out and holds down the unemployed? It feels like a major separation of the "haves and have-nots" is happening. The middle ground is getting smaller and smaller. Its time for politicians to stop the chatter about this situation and DO SOMETHING!

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Written by mygoditsfullofdoom
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