ChoicePoint...A Shady Ass Company, Read!

http://epic.org/privacy/choicepoint/

My old lady recently lost a job opportunity because of this shady ass background check company. Apparently Pollo Tropical does not want to hire her because of a MISDEMEANOR possession charge that happened over 10 years ago that she was not even sent to jail over. Apparently the company is selling personal information to the government...it that even legal?

 

Yes, it is legal.

It is being used as a tool by more and more companies when hiring.

 

If she applied, then she filled out one of these applications, which gives them the right to do a background check. She has no legal recourse as they reserve the right to hire or not based upon their judgment after screening is done.​

http://www.carrols.com/Pdf/Pollo_Application.pdf
Source​

 

Could she apply for a pardon?

 

Perfectly legal and logical.

 

Was it for marijuana? In California you don't have to report any misdemeanor marijuana charges over two years old, and all applications in Ca. have to state that. The employers are supposed to disregard any such things also, but do they?

The fucked part about it is that when looking for work, you have no rights relative to the employer unless you can clearly prove discriminatory hiring practices. Beyond that all the employer has to say is that they found someone else. The fact that they even mentioned a 10 year old charge is odd. Was she certain to get hired before this info came out, and they therefore had to provide a reason for not hiring?

 

Actually this statement in the application is a HUGE red flag about the company;

All employees hired after September 15, 2005, agree to participate in our Mandatory Arbitration Program (“MAP”) as a condition of employment. All disputes arising from application for, employment and termination (except those prohibited by law) will be resolved through binding arbitration. Arbitration is an alternative dispute resolution process administered by an independent arbitration association. Additional material on MAP is available on request.

What that tells me is the company has/had some sketchy employment practices and have been sued, more than once most likely, therefore you have to abide by arbitration rather than court. Very sketchy indeed. I have gone to different doctors because of them requireing me to sign such an agreement. I just don't get instilled with a lot of confidence when a Dr. or employer basically tells me "If I fuck up, no matter how badly, you agree to not sue me in court."

Fuck that!

 

What sucks is that she was honest with the company about her background and they said it shouldn't be a problem. The charges are almost 15 years old. She went to the Pollo Tropical corporate headquarters and signed all her paper work to accept the position that was offered to her. They even gave her a start date and told her which store she was working at. I just think that they should not have even set anything in stone until her background check came back. And yes the "MAP" was a huge red flag.

 

I did some hunting around and she may be able to ask that this be expunged. There are conditions that apply and she would have to meet those.

The first step is to contact the Florida Department of Law Enforcement for a Certificate of Eligibility, the cost of that is $75. After that is done then the court is petitioned and a judge hears the case and can then expunge the record.

It may be worth looking into.

 

The only thing they told her was that her "driving record was bad" her last charge was for driving on a suspended license 6 years ago. She hasn't had any charges since.

 

Okay, sorry then as it appears then she can not have it expunged as there can be no other incidents since the initial one. They do not have to be even related.

 

I had seen a whole news program about how people were getting passed up for jobs among all other kinds of problems due to most of the background check companies not doing their homework. They would pull info from any name/ss/dob that remotely matched. There were squeaky clean people showing up with felonies. It really screwed up some people lives, missing out on/loosing jobs and there was nothing they could do about to but ask the company to remove the info.
So yea esp if its something she did, there is nothing she can do.

heh yea Ive gotten something like that to sign at 3 jobs. I always refused to sign it and it was never really a big deal. Funny thing is all thoes jobs were horrible and treated their employees like shit, I didnt make it more then a week at any of em.

 

Not funny at all. That is how they avoid public law suits. Any company that wants you to agree to arbritation would cause me to ask "Why, what are you worried about?" Companies that don't have a track record of being sued by employees don't need anything like that.

 

The clerk of courts of some cities have a website where you can look up people's criminal and civil records for free. The sheriff's office will usually do a background check for a small fee. Even without giant data clearing houses such as Choicepoint, people can find out.

Also, 'expunged' is a rather colloquial term. 'Sealed' is the legal term for expunged. The information doesn't get destroyed. It's just not available to the general public and most employers.

I don't know all the legalities of sealed documents, but I'd expect that particular groups would still have access to such records, such as security-related groups within the federal government. For example, if you tried to apply for a job with the CIA, they'd probably have access to any sealed records related to your criminal or civil background.

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