Credit check for employment.

trobinett

Senior Member
Oct 25, 2004
1,832
162
48
Arkansas, The Ozarks
By Ben Arnoldy | Staff writer of The Christian Science Monitor
BOSTON - Lisa Bailey worked for five months at Harvard University as a temp entering donations into a database. When the university made the job a salaried position, Ms. Bailey, who is black, saw a chance to lift herself out of dead-end jobs.
Bailey's superiors encouraged her to apply, she says, but turned her down after discovering her bad credit history.
Lisa Bailey: She says Harvard denied her a job because of her credit history.
MARY KNOX MERRILL – STAFF
In the Monitor
Friday, 01/19/07

Bailey, with her lawyer, has lodged a complaint against Harvard charging racial discrimination. The reason: Studies show that minorities are more likely to have bad credit, but credit problems have not been shown to negatively affect job performance.
Some privacy and minority advocates are now seeing credit as a civil rights issue as minorities start to fight employers and insurers who base decisions on credit histories. Their effort could slow the near doubling in credit checks by employers in the past decade, which impacts millions of Americans who are struggling with debt.
"It's definitely a civil rights issue because of the growing use of credit reports and credit scores for hiring, renting an apartment, insurance, and the fact that people of color have not been integrated into the credit scoring system as much as traditional, white, middle-class America," says Evan Hendricks, author of "Credit Scores & Credit Reports: How the System Really Works, What You Can Do."
In a 2004 study involving 2 million people, the Texas Department of Insurance found that blacks have an average credit score roughly 10 percent to 35 percent worse than whites; Hispanics have scores 5 percent to 25 percent worse than whites.

http://www.csmonitor.com/2007/0118/p01s03-ussc.html


Wonder if this would impact the "Bridge People" of New Orleans?

Seems like a reasonable check to run on potential employee's.

What say you?
 
By Ben Arnoldy | Staff writer of The Christian Science Monitor
BOSTON - Lisa Bailey worked for five months at Harvard University as a temp entering donations into a database. When the university made the job a salaried position, Ms. Bailey, who is black, saw a chance to lift herself out of dead-end jobs.
Bailey's superiors encouraged her to apply, she says, but turned her down after discovering her bad credit history.
Lisa Bailey: She says Harvard denied her a job because of her credit history.
MARY KNOX MERRILL – STAFF
In the Monitor
Friday, 01/19/07

Bailey, with her lawyer, has lodged a complaint against Harvard charging racial discrimination. The reason: Studies show that minorities are more likely to have bad credit, but credit problems have not been shown to negatively affect job performance.
Some privacy and minority advocates are now seeing credit as a civil rights issue as minorities start to fight employers and insurers who base decisions on credit histories. Their effort could slow the near doubling in credit checks by employers in the past decade, which impacts millions of Americans who are struggling with debt.
"It's definitely a civil rights issue because of the growing use of credit reports and credit scores for hiring, renting an apartment, insurance, and the fact that people of color have not been integrated into the credit scoring system as much as traditional, white, middle-class America," says Evan Hendricks, author of "Credit Scores & Credit Reports: How the System Really Works, What You Can Do."
In a 2004 study involving 2 million people, the Texas Department of Insurance found that blacks have an average credit score roughly 10 percent to 35 percent worse than whites; Hispanics have scores 5 percent to 25 percent worse than whites.

http://www.csmonitor.com/2007/0118/p01s03-ussc.html


Wonder if this would impact the "Bridge People" of New Orleans?

Seems like a reasonable check to run on potential employee's.

What say you?
Credit checks done when working in banks and teaching. Don't have to be 'perfect' but cannot be 'risky'. I understand the bank, the only reason I can see with teaching, is character.
 
Credit checks done when working in banks and teaching. Don't have to be 'perfect' but cannot be 'risky'. I understand the bank, the only reason I can see with teaching, is character.

don't want high credit risks working in posistions where they can be compromised or steal......

her job... "entering donations into a database."

i would have done a credit check as well....her job involved money and information....
 
These days, many employers do a credit check and a basic criminal background check for most mid-level positions, and the investigations get more detailed depending on the amount of power in the position.
 
Buy what you can afford, pay your bills on time.

Employers checking credit can be a good protective action taking by the employer, not only for the company but the other employees as well.
 
Buy what you can afford, pay your bills on time.

Employers checking credit can be a good protective action taking by the employer, not only for the company but the other employees as well.

Actually, you raise an important question MtnBiker.

Job Safety HAS become much more important these days, what with disgruntled former employees coming back to shoot up the work place.

Wonder what the "credit rating" of those folks was?
 
I think employers should be able to use whatever criteria they want for someone that works at their facility. As long as the company isn't publically traded, run by the government, or part of a group of companies that has a written agreement to specific standards, then a company should be able to discriminate by whatever means they deem necassary. If that means they dont want whites or blacks or hispanics, then so be it. If they don't want women or men, then so be it. If they don't want people who are credit risks, then so be it. Their are limiting themselves by doing so, but a company should be allowed to hire and fire who they want.
 
This is sort of a sticky subject for me. I can understand employers, loan institutions, and other interested parties wanting to know about people for different reasons, but I also think that people/originations collecting data on someone "SHOULD" be illegal and not allowed to happen. Credit, paying or not paying bills, should be a very private matter between the borrower and lender and that no database should exist.
 
All of you miss the point. Whether or not a credit check is necessarily a qualification of employment, one's credit rating is purely a result of one's own choices. Everyone is born with perfect credit. You, personally, have to screw up to get bad credit, and if you stop screwing up, bad credit is easy to fix. Claiming that a credit check is descrimination is like claiming that a dress code or hair style standards are descrimination. This is just another effort by a bunch of idiots to try to release themselves from the consequences of their actions.
 
All of you miss the point. Whether or not a credit check is necessarily a qualification of employment, one's credit rating is purely a result of one's own choices. Everyone is born with perfect credit. You, personally, have to screw up to get bad credit, and if you stop screwing up, bad credit is easy to fix. Claiming that a credit check is descrimination is like claiming that a dress code or hair style standards are descrimination. This is just another effort by a bunch of idiots to try to release themselves from the consequences of their actions.

Hmm, that kinda removes all the "wiggle room" Hobbit.:cool:
 
All of you miss the point. Whether or not a credit check is necessarily a qualification of employment, one's credit rating is purely a result of one's own choices. Everyone is born with perfect credit. You, personally, have to screw up to get bad credit, and if you stop screwing up, bad credit is easy to fix. Claiming that a credit check is descrimination is like claiming that a dress code or hair style standards are descrimination. This is just another effort by a bunch of idiots to try to release themselves from the consequences of their actions.

You are not born with perfect credit. You are born with NO credit. Try to buy a house with NO credit and see how far that gets you. As soon as you open a credit line to develop a credit score, is your credit perfect? Of course not. They use a SECRET credit rating system to create your score, although it would not be perfect mainly because you wouldn't have much "history" of using credit.

This world did just FINE before FICO scores. Now everybody's life depends on three little scores that are totally dependent upon the private SECRET manipulations of software created by the industry. You can wind up paying THOUSANDS of dollars more for a house because your score is a miniscule 2 points lower than the arbitrary number required. Yet your score can JUMP all over the place for no obvious reasons...just try checking it any day of the week.

Not only are your credit reports providing FICO scores but they are providing your life history to people. How's that for PRIVACY? You don't have any. And let's not forget the 3 or 4 shadow reporting agencies that are floating around watching you and recording tidbits of your life. This has become your "rap sheet" and others now have your number and can control you and your life.

This subtle NOOSE is slowly choking your privacy and freedom and you can't do a thing about it.

ps: my credit is great but that does NOT mean I like this system.
 
You are not born with perfect credit. You are born with NO credit. Try to buy a house with NO credit and see how far that gets you. As soon as you open a credit line to develop a credit score, is your credit perfect? Of course not. They use a SECRET credit rating system to create your score, although it would not be perfect mainly because you wouldn't have much "history" of using credit.

Myth. It's really easy to get underwriting on a home mortgage which will look at things like how much you make and how much you have in savings, rather than a retarded credit score.

Personally, I think credit is the impatient idiot's way of buying things for more than twice what they're worth. I have never borrowed money and I never will.

Also, a credit check doesn't necessarily mean a sheet of paper with that oh so magical credit score on it. It usually means a credit history showing all of your debts and how quickly you paid it off.

On a side note: www.daveramsey.com
 
Myth. It's really easy to get underwriting on a home mortgage which will look at things like how much you make and how much you have in savings, rather than a retarded credit score.

Personally, I think credit is the impatient idiot's way of buying things for more than twice what they're worth. I have never borrowed money and I never will.

Also, a credit check doesn't necessarily mean a sheet of paper with that oh so magical credit score on it. It usually means a credit history showing all of your debts and how quickly you paid it off.

On a side note: www.daveramsey.com

Well you could probably swing a subprime, maybe even a conventional mortgage loan today if you have NO credit history but have a good income and enough time on the job. Exceptions can be made. However, as I said before you will probably wind up paying thousands extra over the years because your mortgage rate will be higher.

You are smart to not get into debt but that just is not the reality for most people.

Better believe it, today it is all about those "oh so magical scores". You've become a number with a number rating in this brave new world. Did you know that most likely your monthly auto insurance payment is based upon scores? Same thing goes for your home insurance. Not to mention getting a job. More and more your life is being determined by what your "scores" say.
 

Forum List

Back
Top