Credit reports shouldn't determine a person's credibility. There is no such thing as a perfect life on earth. If we don't judge a book by its cover, then why should we judge an individual by his credit report especially regarding employment opportunities. Recently a company called CoreLogic has developed a new credit reporting system called "Score". This system goes beyond the traditional credit investigation by delving into several years of checking your payment history for utilities, rent, and payday loans. The company claims that this will help people with little or no credit history, however, it can also be a detriment to people who have paid bills late due to lay-offs, health issues or everyday emergencies such unexpected car repairs. Today, your credit history has become an integral part of your employment search. The face to face job interview has almost become obsolete because rather that looking at your job skills and credentials, companies are eliminating well qualified applicants based on their credit report.
Never before have there been so many jobsites and companies offering to rewrite your resume for a some type of fee usually on a monthly basis. First of all, paying the fee does not guarantee employment and secondly, it may seem nominal to some people, but when you're unemployed every dollar counts. Now even on-line job fairs are charging a fee to access the job listings. Attending job fairs is usually just a waste of time since they refer you right back to their website. It's quite possible that you are not going to be hired if your credit is bad, ironically, you cannot repair bad credit unless you obtain gainful employment. Here's the real score, companies need to stop using credit scores to justify denying consideration of employment or loans for badly needed transportation for those who are "under-employed". New legislation needs to be implemented nationally in order to prevent companies from using credit reports to impede a persons right to work. Enforcing the law within "private industry" could be problematic, therefore it should include some type of random monitoring system.
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