What you may not have known about Credit Checks and Credit Ratings. MUST KNOW AND SCREAM ABOUT

[guardian]

66. Maybe not?

It is certainly a good idea to investigate a company that you want to work for. Check with BBB or Dun & Bradstreet. Though a D&B report will cost a couple hundred bucks. Though many small businesses don't belong to BBB or have a current DUNS. You are probably better off just searching the internet, Linkedin and the like if a smaller business. If the company is publicly traded then there should be plenty of free info available. Review the financials from the SEC filing if you feel you can understand the data.

As far as running a personal credit report on your boss....I think that would be detrimental to your being hired. First, you need a person's written approval to legally run a credit report. I doubt you'll get it and probably kill your chance of being hired if you ask for it. Secondly, you'll have to apply to and join a credit check company who will first verify who you are, and verify that you have a legitimate reason to run credit checks on people. By law you cannot just "run a credit report" on another person without permission and a good reason. I'm not sure wanting to check out a future employer would qualify as a legally valid reason. Then you'll have to pay a fee to run a check once accepted and verified with a credit check service.

Then there are reporting requirements if you turned down an applicant (in this case the employer by not accepting the job) where you are legally bound to send a formal notice of declining the applicant based on information in the credit report.