Does TJX Companies hire people with felonies?

What TJX Companies has said

Nearly all of the TJX U.S. store job postings we read for T.J. Maxx, Marshalls, HomeGoods and Homesense say applicants with arrest or conviction records will be considered for employment. We saw the line on store postings in more than 20 states, but not on one older Marshalls posting or on any distribution-center posting we checked. TJX is not a Second Chance Business Coalition member, and we found no second-chance hiring program in its careers pages or recent corporate responsibility reports. Its California applicant notice says that once TJX extends an offer it may, depending on the job, collect information for a background check, such as criminal convictions, where the law allows. We found no notice for other states and no published vendor or drug-test policy.

• Statement in a job posting

  U.S. store postings end with a line saying applicants with arrest or conviction records will be considered for employment. We saw it on T.J. Maxx, Marshalls and HomeGoods store postings in Utah, Oklahoma, Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, Georgia, Alabama, New Mexico, New York and California.¹

Does TJX Companies do background checks?

TJX Companies runs background checks. TJX's recruitment data protection statement for California residents says that if TJX extends an offer, it may, depending on the position, collect the information needed for a background check, such as criminal convictions, where the law allows, and it lists performing background checks among its uses of applicant data. That notice covers only California applicants; we found no TJX notice for other U.S. states, and none that names a screening company.²

• Criminal history

• How long a background check takes

Does TJX Companies drug test?

TJX Companies hasn't published a drug testing policy. We found no TJX careers page, applicant notice or U.S. job posting that mentions pre-employment drug testing.

Rules for specific jobs

• Distribution center jobs

  The warehouse postings we read (Union, Ohio; Jefferson, Georgia; Cheyenne, Wyoming; Fort Worth and San Antonio, Texas) didn't include the arrest-or-conviction line or any screening language.³

• Store loss prevention jobs

  U.S. loss prevention detective postings we read (Albany and Schenectady, New York) carry the same arrest-or-conviction line as other store jobs and list no extra screening.⁴

Your rights, and how far back a check can go

• Under the federal Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA), an employer must get your written permission before it gets a background report about you from a background screening company.^11,12,13
• Before an employer decides not to hire, keep, or promote you because of something in a background report, it must give you a copy of the report and a document called "A Summary of Your Rights Under the Fair Credit Reporting Act."^11,12
• You have the right to dispute inaccurate or incomplete information in your background report directly with the company that made it.^11,14
• The FCRA's seven-year limit does not apply to criminal convictions, so under federal law a conviction can show up on a background report no matter how old it is.^15,16
• Under the FCRA, background and credit reports generally cannot include arrest records, civil lawsuits, or civil judgments that are more than seven years old (or older than the statute of limitations, if that is longer).^15,17

Your full background check rights

Before you apply

• You can ask a background screening company for the information it has on you, and the CFPB keeps a list of consumer reporting companies, including employment screening companies, with their contact details.^11,14,18
• According to the Clean Slate Initiative, 14 states and Washington, D.C. have passed Clean Slate laws that meet its criteria for automatically clearing eligible records: Pennsylvania, Utah, New Jersey, Connecticut, Michigan, Delaware, Virginia, California, Oklahoma, Colorado, Minnesota, New York, Illinois, and Missouri, plus D.C.¹⁹
• The Federal Bonding Program, run by the U.S. Department of Labor, lets states give employers free fidelity bonds that protect them against losses from a newly hired worker's dishonest acts, for job seekers with past justice involvement or in recovery from substance use.^20,21

See whether you can clear your record in your state