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Labor and employment attorney Victor Forberger offered several tips for people who are filing for unemployment during a recent webinar.
He advised people to know the difference between an initial claim and a weekly certification; to know that mistakes can be used against you; to make sure you’re searching for work; to document and retain records of your work search actions; to report all job offers; and to know if the reason you left your job is valid.
In Wisconsin, filing for state assistance after becoming unemployed can be an odyssey.
A long list of mistakes can derail your claim, jeopardizing your benefits and even opening you up to legal trouble.
Wisconsin Watch attended the State Bar of Wisconsin‘s unemployment filing seminar, where labor and employment attorney Victor Forberger presented on the mechanics of the winding filing process.
We used that information to compile this list of tips and common mistakes to avoid when filing your unemployment claim. Here are some things to know.
File an initial claim, where you report that you separated from a job.
File a weekly “certification,” where you must continue to prove you meet each of the state’s criteria for benefits.
Department of Workforce Development staff and judges use the word “claim” interchangeably while referring to each of these processes, Forberger said. Knowing the difference can help lessen mistakes.
Know that mistakes can be used against you
The online system will repeatedly ask if all of the information you’re entering is truthful, as a method of protecting against fraud.
Thus, any mistake you make is assumed to be purposeful, unless you can point to a specific reason that might have caused the mistake, such as a disability, that shows you’re not at fault. That’s hard to do.
Mistakes can — and often do — lead people to be charged with fraud, enabling the state to claw back unemployment benefits and charge penalty fees.
Dates are tricky. Prepare accordingly
When you file your initial claim, you’ll be asked to select the first week you want to begin receiving benefits. That date may have nothing to do with when you actually lost your job.
“You may have suffered a job loss, and the employer gave your vacation pay that you had accrued for 20 years, and so you’re being paid now for six weeks,” Forberger said. “You don’t file your unemployment claim on the week that the job loss ended. Start your unemployment claim when the vacation pay has run out.”
People often try to start the initial claims in the past, on the date that they lost their job.
You are supposed to file your initial claim within seven days of the week you want to start receiving benefits. If it’s outside of that time frame, the state considers it a “late claim,” which is very difficult to prove and accepted under only what the state deems “exceptional circumstances.”
Reporting the wrong date could disqualify you and derail the process of receiving benefits.
Make sure you’re searching for work
The main way people disqualify themselves, Forberger said, is by not properly showing the state you are looking for new work.
You must conduct four new work search actions every week and upload the proof during the weekly certification process.
Forberger recommends doing five actions, to be safe, in the event that one action is disqualified.
Falsely reporting actions could be considered fraud, disqualifying your claim and opening you up to legal penalties.
Hang onto your documents
You should keep all of the documented proof of your work searches handy for one year.
The state randomly audits people’s work searches for accuracy, so you could be asked to submit proof of your work search actions for any particular week. Any issues could mean having to repay your benefits for that week.
Report all job offers
During the weekly certification process, you will be asked if you have turned down a “bona fide job offer” that week, meaning a legitimate job offer, complete with a pay rate and list of duties.
“It can’t just be like, ‘Hey, come by tomorrow, I got a job for you,’” Forberger said. “It’s got to be like, ‘You’re going to get hired at $15 an hour to stock shelves at my department store, and your schedule is going to be in the evenings, part time.”
During the first six weeks of your job search on unemployment, you are allowed to turn down what the state deems suitable work without threatening your benefits if the offer involves lower skills or significantly lower pay than before.
After those six weeks, you have to take any “bona fide” offer that comes your way, Forberger said. You must also report all of the offers that you’ve turned down, even if they weren’t suitable work. Failing to do these things could disqualify you from unemployment benefits.
Don’t file your weekly certifications on Sunday
People often file their weekly certifications on Sundays thinking they’re being proactive by doing it early. But there’s no phone support available to call for help on Sundays.
“There’s no need to rush because you’re going to get paid,” Forberger said. “Getting it one or two days earlier is not going to make all that much of a difference.”
Know if your reason for leaving your job is valid
When filing for unemployment, you will be asked to report why you separated from all of the jobs you’ve held within the last 18 months.
The onus is on you to understand if your reason for leaving a job is one Wisconsin considers “disqualifying,” and report it accordingly. Mistakes you make here will be treated as intentional.
Among the reasons that will disqualify you from receiving unemployment benefits:
You work a job considered “excluded.” Learn more here.
Among the reasons that are accepted:
Were laid off or your work hours were reduced because your employer did not have enough work for you.
Left your last job and can show it was for a good cause. Learn more about what is defined as “good cause” here.
Miranda Dunlap reports on pathways to success in northeast Wisconsin, working in partnership with Open Campus. Find her on Instagram and Twitter, or send her an email at mdunlap@wisconsinwatch.org.
Wisconsin Watch is a nonprofit, nonpartisan newsroom. Subscribe to our newsletters for original stories and our Friday news roundup.
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UW Health leaders created a new company called WorkForward to help health care systems and state agencies nationwide create their own apprenticeship programs.
UW Health officials started offering apprenticeships to their employees in 2018.
The program has helped the company fill entry-level roles and retain existing staff while filling gaps for in-demand positions.
But experts say apprenticeships aren’t a silver bullet: They require clinical staff to supervise apprentices; employers have to pay staff for hours they’re in school; and each state has its own regulations for apprenticeships.
Violet LaClair was ready to leave her job.
As a certified nursing assistant at UW Health in Madison, she used the skills she developed while caring for her dying grandmother for nine years. Her co-workers had supported her through her gender transition. She’d even won an award for providing “extraordinary” care.
She loved her workplace, but after four years, she wanted a change.
“I felt like I’d done it all,” LaClair said. “I felt like at some point I needed to challenge myself more.”
She thought about going back to school, but that didn’t seem doable. She was already in her 40s and didn’t have time or money to spend.
Then she learned she could get trained to be a medical assistant for free, while working, through an apprenticeship program UW Health started in 2018. She pays no school costs, and she gets paid for the time she spends in class.
Three days a week, she works at the company’s Union Corners clinic, where she gets patients situated, takes blood pressure, flushes ears and more.
“I can pretty much do anything the doctor asked me to,” LaClair said. Two days a week, she takes classes on pharmacology, laboratory procedures, and law and ethics.
“I think the program is great,” LaClair said. “It’s given me a whole new chapter in my life, and something to be excited about.”
Opportunities like these are novel, but increasingly common. The idea is simple: Maybe the country’s next nurses, surgical technologists and medical assistants are already working in hospitals and clinics. The people who’ve spent years booking appointments or drawing blood might jump at the chance to train for new careers — if their employers will help them do it.
UW Health now offers apprenticeship options for 17 professions, including surgical techs, pharmacy technicians, respiratory therapists and registered nurses. Apprentices pay nothing for their course work, and they get paid to be in class.
To date, more than 1,000 apprentices have graduated.
Bridgett Willey, who oversaw the launch of those apprenticeships, said they’ve helped fill a critical gap. Wisconsin colleges alone just aren’t graduating enough students to meet the needs of the three major health systems in southern Wisconsin, Willey said.
The popular programs, which attract far more applicants than they can accommodate, have helped the company fill entry-level roles and hold onto existing staff. Before it began offering apprenticeships, as many as 3 in 10 positions for medical assistants, nursing assistants and pharmacy technicians were unfilled, Willey said. Today, it’s around 1 in 10.
“We’ve increased our supply by growing our own and training our own folks,” Willey said.
UW Health isn’t the only health system trying this model. Apprenticeships, once a rarity in health care, have become increasingly common at hospitals and clinics nationwide.
But offering this kind of on-the-job training isn’t always easy. Now, UW Health plans to use what it’s learned to help other states overcome the financial and bureaucratic barriers that can stand in the way. In May, the health system announced it created a separate company called WorkForward to help health systems and state agencies elsewhere set up apprenticeships. Willey, who directs that new project, thinks it’s the first such initiative by a U.S. health care company.
The health care apprenticeship surge
Historically, apprenticeships have been a key on-ramp to technical trades like plumbing and carpentry, allowing trainees to earn as they learn.
Now, apprenticeships are flourishing in U.S. hospitals and clinics, too. In just five years, the number of registered apprentices in the health care field has grown by more than 40%, according to the U.S. Department of Labor, as employers have expanded existing programs and others have started new ones.
Stethoscopes are pictured at UW Health on July 16, 2026, in Madison, Wis. UW Health started its apprenticeship program in 2018. To date, more than 1,000 apprentices have graduated. (Narayan Mahon for Wisconsin Watch)
The boom comes as demand for health care workers has shot up across the country, triggered by the growing needs of an aging population and a wave of longtime health care workers retiring. By 2038, the country will be short about 109,000 registered nurses, 61,000 physical therapists, 33,000 pharmacy technicians and 13,000 respiratory therapists, according to projections by the National Center for Health Workforce Analysis.
Meanwhile, vocational and on-the-job training is becoming increasingly popular across the board, said Susan Skillman, senior principal research scientist at the University of Washington Center for Health Workforce Studies.
“Apprenticeships in general are growing,” Skillman said. “We’re kind of in that place in the nation where the pendulum is moving away from four-year college degrees.”
Staff seize opportunity to advance
Some health apprenticeships last months while others last years. At UW Health, apprentices training to become medical assistants finish in 10 months while future registered nurses train for four years.
No matter the length or industry, all apprenticeships involve a combination of on-the-job training and classroom instruction. In the case of Wisconsin’s registered apprentices, who are approved through the state’s Department of Workforce Development, employers must pay apprentices for the time they spend in class. In some cases, the employer pays for the apprentices’ school costs, too.
At UW Health, the employer covers tuition. The health system’s staff also coordinate the apprentices’ work and school schedules to avoid conflicts.
Violet LaClair practices drawing blood from a mannequin arm while Lisa Fahey, manager of Ambulatory Apprenticeships, observes. (Narayan Mahon for Wisconsin Watch)
Those were big selling points for Brianna Matheson, 35, who had worked as a medical assistant for 12 years when she learned last spring that UW Health was starting a three-year surgical tech apprenticeship. She’d spent time in the operating room before, and she liked helping with clinical procedures.
“I was just ready for something more,” Matheson said. “I was in clinics for so long, doing the same thing for so long. I wanted to learn again, be a student again, and be a novice.”
When the application opened, she was the first to apply.
“I had kind of given up on the idea of going back to school because I, like so many others, need full-time income, and I didn’t really want to give up all of my free time to work full time and go to school in the evenings and weekends,” said Matheson, who now processes and delivers supplies to the operating room at Madison’s University Hospital.
Not only does she not pay tuition, but the Department of Workforce Development offers a stipend for scrubs, reimburses mileage to and from school, and even covers some daycare costs for apprentices with kids, Matheson said.
The position also let Matheson keep her prior $25 hourly wage, reflecting the raises she’d earned during more than a decade on the job. When Matheson graduates in May 2028, she’ll earn surgical tech wages, which range from around $30 to $44 an hour, according to current UW Health job listings.
“I would not have been going back to school at this point in life to pursue this without the support of specifically the apprenticeship program that UW Health is offering,” Matheson said. “I wouldn’t have done it on my own.”
Apprenticeships attract new job applicants
Offering apprenticeships could help health systems draw entry-level job applicants like 25-year-old DeForest native Alex Lippman.
Lippman trained as a certified nursing assistant in high school, then worked at a skilled nursing facility in Madison. He started college at Arizona State University with plans to become a doctor, but moved back to Wisconsin when his grandmother fell ill in his sophomore year. He wanted to continue his education but figured he’d missed his chance.
Then, in 2023, UW Health announced it was starting the state’s first apprenticeship for registered nurses. That apprenticeship, like all of UW Health’s multiyear apprenticeships that lead to degrees, are open only to employees who’ve worked for the system for at least six months.
“I had a plan of trying to get into this program because going back to school on my own was no longer feasible,” Lippman said. He got a job as a certified nursing assistant and began the apprenticeship the next year.
Today he takes classes at Madison College and works three night shifts a week caring for patients with brain and spine injuries in University Hospital’s neuro intensive care unit. He’s on track to graduate in 2028.
Violet LaClair works three days per week as a medical assistant in a UW Health clinic, where she gets patients situated, takes blood pressure, flushes ears and more. “I can pretty much do anything the doctor asked me to,” she said. (Narayan Mahon for Wisconsin Watch)
UW Health’s shorter training programs, meanwhile, are open to new applicants as well as current employees. Already, some have finished one and moved onto another, looking to advance their careers, Willey said.
“What we’re seeing is that people come in through one of our entry-level (apprenticeship) programs like medical assistant or nursing assistant, get their feet under them working in that capacity, and then now they’re applying for our degreed registered apprenticeship programs,” Willey said.
This isn’t the first time the company has built its own pipeline of health care workers. In 2013, Willey started a program called Health Occupations and Professions Exploration, or HOPE, where high school students spend a Saturday learning to do CPR, place a breathing tube in a mannequin, and more. The goal, Willey said, is to show students the range of careers available in health care. The program has trained about 6,500 students.
How much can the model grow?
Apprenticeships offer a unique way to address workforce shortages and help employees move up on the job, said Andy MacCracken, who coordinates health workforce planning for North Carolina at the NC Center on the Workforce for Health. That, he said, is one reason the number of apprentices and apprenticeships in the health care field has soared in recent years.
Still, he said, it’s not clear exactly how much of the health worker shortage can be solved through apprenticeships.
“We need to have a realistic view about what we’re actually aiming for when deploying apprenticeships as a solution,” MacCracken said. “I think apprenticeships are a really helpful tool in the toolbox. They’re not the only one.”
One challenge: It’s expensive to pay the clinical staff needed to supervise apprentices, so it can be hard for health system leaders to make the business case to their boards. Even health systems that embrace apprenticeships may not be able to accept as many apprentices as they’d like.
UW Health pays for its apprenticeship program with a mix of its own funds, private donations and public funds, though Willey said the latter is usually only available for starting up a new program.
Mannequin arms wait for UW Health staff to practice drawing blood on July 16, 2026, in Madison, Wis. UW Health created a company called WorkForward in May to help health care systems and state agencies build their own apprenticeship programs. (Narayan Mahon for Wisconsin Watch)
Still, there are always far more applicants than openings. When the registered nursing apprenticeship launched in 2023, 200 employees applied for 16 slots. Last year, 70 people applied for 40 medical assistant apprenticeships.
Another challenge: Each state has its own laws about what counts as an apprenticeship and what standards an employer must meet when offering one. Likewise, the regulations for each profession may vary from state to state too. And then there are the accrediting agencies that approve educational programs, which are still getting used to the idea that students might get paid for their clinical training hours.
Willey said WorkForward will publish research on apprenticeship approaches that work, lobby for resources to support such programs and help other states identify potential funding sources. The company is a nonprofit, she said, which will apply for private and public grants. It will not receive direct funding from UW Health.
Currently, she said, WorkForward is working in Massachusetts with Tufts Medicine and Mass General Brigham — the state’s largest health care employer — and 12 of the state’s community and technical colleges.
“It would be great if we could take the solutions that we’ve built and spread (them at) scale across the U.S. … Health care continues to be a driver of new jobs for the U.S. economy,” Willey said, “and we have an aging population who needs more care, and so we need to be addressing these things now.”
MacCracken said he hasn’t heard of another health care employer taking on this role, but he thinks it makes sense, as employers may be more willing to listen to other employers.
In North Carolina, he said, he’s already seen how a few model programs can pave the way for others.
“I think because of the successes of some of the early adopters who have put these programs in action, we’re seeing great results, and so that’s helping inspire more action and scalability and replication.” MacCracken said.
Natalie Yahr reports on pathways to success statewide for Wisconsin Watch, working in partnership with Open Campus. Email her at nyahr@wisconsinwatch.org.
Wisconsin Watch is a nonprofit, nonpartisan newsroom. Subscribe to our newsletters for original stories and our Friday news roundup.
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Students from the age of 11 to 18 can enroll at career-focused summer camps at Lakeshore College.
The June camps focused on culinary arts, manufacturing and information technology careers.
The camps introduce students to high-demand careers when they’re young, which leaders hope will spark their interest and help fill worker shortages.
In mid-June, roughly a dozen young teens wearing white chef coats lined up at stations inside a classroom resembling a real industrial kitchen.
They gingerly cut slices of avocado, cucumber and mamenori — soy paper — before finally using a bamboo sheet to roll the ingredients into a log of sushi.
Their instructions, delivered by a Lakeshore College instructor, looked much like lessons given in a real college class. But the students weren’t getting graded — they were attending the college’s summer camp, designed to introduce them at a young age to high-demand jobs in the region.
Across the Cleveland, Wisconsin, campus that week, students between the ages of 11 and 18 learned the basics of culinary, manufacturing and information technology careers. It’s all part of a growing push by education and workforce leaders to expose students to high-demand careers long before they graduate high school, hoping early exploration will help fill worker shortages.
In just three days, Haiden Taylor learned to cook hummus, tzatziki, pizza, and, her favorite, doner kebab. It was her second year enrolling in the camp. As she heads into her senior year of high school, she’s now considering culinary as a career.
“I like working with people. I like working with my hands. I really don’t see myself at a desk job,” Taylor said.
It all offers kids much more exploration and hands-on learning than Electro and Maintenance Mechanic instructor Kaven Lewis had as a kid. Then, people discouraged skilled trade work, he said. Events like the summer camp feel like proof that this is changing today.
“It was … ‘Go to college, get an education,’” Lewis said. “Now it’s like, ‘Trade school, that’s where all the money is going to be.’ It’s kind of cool to be in the middle of that transition … It’s cool to see these kids coming in and being more interested in that blue collar, hands-on type of career.”
Opening students’ eyes
On the other side of campus, a group of children between ages 11 and 13 appeared dwarfed by the cavernous garage they gathered in.
The children focused intently on assembling a mousetrap-powered car kit, hoping to build the fastest car to win the drag race that took place in the hallway.
Children build mousetrap-powered cars during a summer camp at Lakeshore College on June 17, 2026. The project taught them about the elements that affect their car’s speed, torque and distance traveled. (Miranda Dunlap / Wisconsin Watch)
The activity involved trial and error — one student’s car detonated at the starting line — but in the process, they learned how different factors impacted speed, torque and the distance the car traveled.
Down the hall, in the welding and fabrication lab, students learned to shape metal into spatulas. When they were asked how many of them took it as an opportunity to engineer gifts for the upcoming Father’s Day holiday, nearly every student’s hand shot in the air.
About half of the students who come to camp are already dead set on what they want to do when they grow up, said Ben Reynolds, chef and culinary arts instructor. The other half have no clue.
“It’s really fun to see the ones that aren’t sure, and then by day three they’re like, ‘yup!’” Reynolds said.
That was the case for student Claude Judd, a 10th grader who signed up for culinary camp just for fun.
The lessons “definitely opened my eyes a little bit,” she said, and she’d now consider a career in culinary arts.
Workers needed
Initially supported by grants and now funded by the college, the summer camps have been put on by Lakeshore for years. The subjects and careers students explore vary annually based on feedback from college faculty and the campers themselves.
The careers highlighted this summer — including manufacturing, culinary arts and information technology — are among those employers in northeast Wisconsin have struggled to fill.
For example, restaurant cook gigs are one of the fastest-growing in northeast Wisconsin, projected to add 740 jobs between 2022 and 2032, state data shows.
Cooks and food preparation workers in the northeast region made an average salary of $34,550 in 2025. Data shows such academic programs have mixed results in actually setting participants up to make more money. According to an analysis of earnings data from Open Campus and The HEA Group, not all culinary programs in the state lead students to higher earnings than the average high school graduate.
In contrast, welding and metal working jobs are expected to grow by about 10% during the same period, adding 430 jobs. Technical college job training programs for these careers usually set students up to make at least $15,000 more than the average high school graduate, and sometimes up to nearly $30,000 more.
Even if students don’t leave camp committed to a particular career path, college leaders say they’re gaining confidence and communication skills.
“At this point in their collegiate journey they’re getting that question of, ‘What do you want to do?’” Reynolds said.
The philosophy that drives the summer camp program is similar to what Reynolds tells his teenage son.
“I don’t expect you to know what you want to do your whole life. I just expect you to go experience things and try things and find out what makes you want to get out of bed.”
Miranda Dunlap reports on pathways to success in northeast Wisconsin, working in partnership with Open Campus. Email her at mdunlap@wisconsinwatch.org.
Wisconsin Watch is a nonprofit, nonpartisan newsroom. Subscribe to our newsletters for original stories and our Friday news roundup.
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Employers must get your permission before they use a third-party company to run a background check.
Employers can use your credit history to make employment decisions, but experts say it’s important to know your rights.
If there’s false or inaccurate information on your credit report, notify the consumer reporting agency that generated the report.
Experts say you can protect yourself by checking your credit report annually and placing a freeze on your credit report to reduce the risk of identity theft.
When you apply for a job, you probably know that your potential employer will check your criminal record. But what about your credit history?
Employers in most states, including Wisconsin, are allowed to run background checks that show your debts, available credit and payment history. Wisconsin Watch asked experts what job seekers and employees should know about this process and their rights.
We spoke to:
Nick Raef, employment attorney at law firm Hawks Quindel.
Jeff Palkowski, state director of the Wisconsin State Council of the Society for Human Resources Management.
Adriana Peguero, assistant city attorney for the city of Madison.
What kind of credit information can employers see?
What questions do you have about jobs and job training in Wisconsin?
Email reporter Natalie Yahr at nyahr@wisconsinwatch.org. We’ll try to find an answer, and we might even write an article about it. But don’t worry: We won’t name you unless you give us permission.
Not all types of background reports show financial information. Those that do typically show your credit accounts, payment history, available credit, bankruptcies, liens and self-reported work history, NerdWallet reports.
The reports do not show your credit score, the three-digit number that lenders, landlords and insurers use to assess how creditworthy you are. They also don’t show your income, birth date, marital status or medical debts.
Unlike when you apply for a credit card or a loan, this is a “soft inquiry,” meaning it won’t affect your credit score and it won’t be visible to other employers or lenders.
Can an employer run a background check without my permission?
No. If employers want to use a third-party company to run a background check, they need written permission. That’s because of the Fair Credit Reporting Act, a 1970 federal law created to protect consumers from false information being included in their credit reports. The law requires that an employer provide “clear and conspicuous” notice in a stand-alone document.
“That means that if they throw the language into the boilerplate of an application, or scribble it in the margins of the position description, or fail to get your consent before pulling the report, then they are in violation of the law,” Raef, the employment attorney, said in an email. The employer can run the background check only if the employee or job applicant signs the document.
If employers want to run a background check later, like if they’re considering you for a promotion, they have to get permission again.
“It’s not the case that if you’re hired by a company that five years later they can go back and use the same acceptance of disclosure from when you were hired,” Raef said.
Notably, the protections of the Fair Credit Reporting Act apply only when employers use another company to run the background check, not when employers use the Wisconsin Circuit Court Access Program (CCAP) or other tools to check a person’s history themselves.
Can an employer use my credit history to make employment decisions?
Yes, though additional restrictions apply in the city of Madison.
If employers see something in the report that makes them choose to take an “adverse action” about your employment (for example, fire, demote or simply not hire), they must give you a “pre-adverse action notice,” along with a copy of your background report, details about the Fair Credit Reporting Act and an explanation of your rights, including the right to dispute the accuracy of the report and get another free report within 60 days.
“The notice must inform an individual that their decision was influenced by the report, but does not have to clarify what exactly within the report has led to the employer’s adverse decision,” Raef said. That, he said, can “leave individuals with little clarity as to the employer’s reasoning.”
The employer must allow time for the employee or applicant to respond before sending a final notice indicating the action the employer took.
Still, Raef said, employers might say they had other reasons for choosing a different candidate.
“Employers have the leeway to base their decision on a multitude of factors,” Raef said. “Oftentimes it can be really hard to sort of draw out what exactly happened here, and that’s where an employment attorney can be really helpful.”
In Madison, employers face stricter limits on how they can use credit history. That’s because credit history is one of the 30 characteristics denoted in the city’s equal opportunity ordinance, alongside homelessness, citizenship status, source of income and physical appearance.
“We have a very large, expansive number of protected classes,” said Peguero, the assistant city attorney.
Employers in Madison can make employment decisions based on credit history only if one of the following is true:
They can demonstrate that the person’s credit history is “substantially related” to the job.
The job requires that the person be bonded and the person’s credit history makes them ineligible. Some jobs, especially ones that involve handling money, valuables or proprietary information, require that employees be covered by a fidelity bond that will reimburse the employer if the employee steals or commits fraud. (Note: The federal government operates a little-known alternative bonding program for people who might otherwise struggle to find work, including those with poor credit. You can learn more about that program here.)
The ordinance applies within the city, so it covers Madison employers. It’s less clear whether it would apply to the growing number of Madison residents who work remotely for employers based elsewhere, Peguero said.
“That analysis would have to be done by the hearing examiner, but it is possible it could extend to an employer that is outside of the city of Madison,” Peguero said.
Why do employers check credit?
Employers may use credit history to assess how trustworthy or responsible a person is, Raef said. An employer may assume that an employee or applicant who has lots of debt, for example, may be more likely to commit fraud, embezzle funds or accept a bribe, especially if the person is in charge of company funds.
But Raef questions whether credit reports are useful in most employment decisions. “There’s not clear evidence that credit history is an indicator of an employee’s capacity to perform well in their job,” Raef said, pointing to a 2012 study that found no correlation.
“Someone might have poor credit on paper because of a domestic abuse situation in their home, or because they were born into really unfortunate circumstances that don’t reflect on their ability to be a great employee,” Raef said.
He worries that credit checks will create a “toxic loop” where the people who most need jobs can’t get them, which only makes their financial situation worse.
“I can see the employer’s side where there are limited and specific circumstances where these checks make sense, but as a broad application, I think that it leads to a lot of unfair employment practices and probably exacerbates existing biases that are systemic within our society,” Raef said.
A 2023 report by the Urban Institute, a national think tank focused on economic and social policy, echoes those concerns.
“Research suggests that workers with low wages are among those harmed by preemployment credit checks, in part because workers with low incomes are the most likely to have imperfect credit records,” the authors write, though they note there’s limited data on low-wage workers specifically.
How common is it for employers to run credit checks?
About half of U.S. employers conduct credit checks when hiring for at least some of their positions, according to a 2021 survey by the Professional Background Screening Association.
Jeff Palkowski leads the Wisconsin State Council of the Society for Human Resources Management. He has worked in human resources in Wisconsin for more than 20 years, mostly in the public sector in Madison. The closest he’s come to an employment credit check was when a friend applied to work at the FBI.
“Anecdotally, I have heard of instances where a credit check may be part of the pre-employment process, but only in rare cases … Personally, I have never filled a role that had a pre-employment credit check as part of the recruitment process,” he said.
Do all states allow employers to do credit checks?
No. As of 2023, 11 states had restricted the practice, according to the Urban Institute. Wisconsin has no state law restricting these checks.
What can I do if I think my credit report is wrong or if I think an employer used my credit history illegally?
If you believe there is a mistake on your credit report, you can dispute it by contacting the consumer reporting agency whose report showed the mistake. The agency must investigate.
“If they can’t verify the accuracy of the information, then they have to remove it,” Raef said.
If you believe an employer used your credit history inappropriately, Raef recommends contacting an employment lawyer.
“If they fail to notify you of a negative decision based on a report, or if they refuse to identify the source of the information that they obtained about you, or if they fail to get your permission at all, then you might be entitled to recover damages,” Raef said.
If you or the employer is located in Madison, you can also file a complaint with the city of Madison’s Department of Civil Rights, which investigates alleged violations of the city’s equal opportunity ordinance. You must file the complaint within 300 days of the incident.
Complaints are far less common than allegations of other kinds of employment discrimination, Peguero said. Of the 805 employment complaints submitted to the office between 2020 and 2025, just eight mentioned credit history.
How can I protect myself?
There are proactive steps you can take now to reduce the chance that a credit check will cause you unnecessary trouble.
“You shouldn’t wait until you have signed something allowing your employer to look into this,” Raef said.
He recommends the following actions:
Request your own credit report to check for errors. You can do this for free once a year at www.annualcreditreport.com. If you find a mistake, report it.
Place a freeze on your credit report to reduce the risk of identity theft, which can damage your credit. A credit freeze blocks anyone from opening a new credit account in your name. You can place a freeze for free online, but you’ll need to do it separately for each of the three nationwide credit reporting agencies: Equifax, Experian and TransUnion. You’ll need to lift the freeze any time you want to apply for credit. “It’s kind of a pain … but it’s worthwhile to do with the amount of pain that it could cause if not done,” Raef said.
Natalie Yahr reports on pathways to success statewide for Wisconsin Watch, working in partnership with Open Campus. Email her at nyahr@wisconsinwatch.org.
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