Happy Monday?
I was pitched a job today (well, technically yesterday) that required my social security number.
Now, a couple things:
1) It’s illegal to require (but not to “ask for”) a social security number for a purpose that doesn’t involve reporting information to the irs.
2) I wouldn’t have such a bug up my ass about this if I hadn’t woken up one morning (years ago) to find major dents in my bank accounts and people sending me all kinds of bizarre emails.
Can’t do it. Especially not now.
I told the recruiter that I’d be happy to provide my social security number when and if we reached a point in the process where it would be legally required. But not for a blind job submission.
“But… this is a really great job!”
“On principle, I can’t do it.”
“I guarantee it will be kept in the strictest confidence.”
“I appreciate that, but you understand it’s not in your power to make that guarantee, right?”
That was the highlight of my day. I’ve spent the rest of it trying to mitigate this bizarre fog my head’s been swimming in. I’ve tried eating all KINDS of things (proving once again that I was right, fatass IS a verb.) I tried caffeinating myself to oblivion, writing code, writing, listening to music (of a few different genres.) Nothing.
“Meh” is the nicest thing I have to say about most things right now.
February 9th, 2010 at 11:20 am
You know why they want it, right?
They want it to run a credit check, which is increasingly used as a hiring criterion (mostly to exclude people).
If you really need a job now, I suggest that you bend on this one, because you’re going to run into it A LOT.
February 9th, 2010 at 12:56 pm
Ah. I hadn’t considered that. Too bad for them.