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It's odd and invasive on a preliminary application, especially if asked without explanation. The explanation may be perfectly logical (e.g. if there were finan
by gregcohn 13y ago
It's odd and invasive on a preliminary application, especially if asked without explanation.
The explanation may be perfectly logical (e.g. if there were financial responsibility in the role and they wanted to run your credit), but the appropriate time for something like this would be after the initial qualification. (All employers, obviously, will eventually need your SSN to report your income to the IRS.)
A move like this is reasonable to interpret as a signal of the kind of company you'd be working for if you joined -- placing their process above your personal privacy. In my experience, the UX of the hiring process has almost always been a very strong indicator of the company UX.
- BWStearns 13y agoAs mentioned in my post on the main thread, I am pretty sure it's for the immigration legality. Credit checks take some money (not much but not free) and also minimally hurt the check-ee, no one runs them on applicants who are not otherwise hired. It may have more to do with their legal counsel insisting on gathering necessary data ahead of time than their preference for process over privacy. (also nice to run into you again on a thread and I love your app)
- gregcohn 13y agoHa! (and thanks!!) ... This is totally logical but I still would never answer it personally. I almost never answer questions that make me uncomfortable during a hiring process and have never been dinged for it AFAIK. I guess everyone has their own thresholds.
- BWStearns 13y agoI used to work in a couple other industries where it was pretty standard practice so it doesn't make me terribly uncomfortable, as long as I know who to sue if my SSN ends up on pastebin. Quantity of bureaucracy is my heuristic for how normal it is to ask this question, though this can vary.