“I will have to politely and respectfully decline as I feel that credit checks are unintentionally/indirectly discriminatory in practice and are not reflective of a person's ability in terms of professional success. There is extensive research that supports this. I find the use of credit checks as a tool to measure a prospective employee's candidacy to be concerning, particularly as a first step in the hiring process.
Thank you very much for your interest and best of luck in your search to fill the position.”
I have fair credit but I feel very strongly about this. I’m not 100% against credit checks. I’ll do one (as a sign of good faith) for a great position after being officially offered the job, and only in that case.
It’s incredible how little research so many employers have done on all of the ways credit checks are terrible barometers of an employee’s abilities. Credit is a discriminatory scam to begin with, in general, but this is one context where it’s especially overused and misused.