Yesterday, the EEOC held a public hearing on the use of credit reports as a basis for making hiring and other employment-related decisions. Jon Hyman, of the Ohio Employer’s Law Blog, has an excellent recap of the discussion which I won’t attempt to duplicate here. Jon argues that it would be unfair to employers to prohibit them from using a criteria that may be quite relevant to various job positions.
A bill to prohibit the use of credit reports by employers in Connecticut never made it to a vote in the Connecticut General Assembly earlier this year. That bill, (H.B. 5061), would have prohibited employers from requiring:
an employee or prospective employee to consent to the creation of a credit report that contains information about the employee’s or prospective employee’s credit score, credit account balances, payment history, savings or checking account balances or savings or checking account numbers as a condition of employment unless (1) such report is substantially related to the employee’s current or potential job, (2) such report is required by law, or (3) the employer reasonably believes that the employee has engaged in specific activity that constitutes a violation of the law.
I have little doubt that given the emphasis on the federal level on this issues, that we will see this bill re-introduced at the beginning of next term. Notably, however, there was much criticism of the bill, including opposition from CHRO, the CBIA, the Department of Public Safety and the Division of Criminal Justice.
For more on the EEOC’s hearing, see posts by the DC Employment Law Update and Employee Screen IQ.