job application

[Releca]

I know some places will fire you for being trans here in the states but when looking for a better paying job during or post transitioning has anyone ran into any issues on the parts that ask gender before changing your marker or on the past names line putting a male name down.

[tgchar21]

Re: Gender question - Except for certain government jobs and the rare job where being of a particular sex is actually a requirement, the only place you should see the question is on a voluntary EEOC survey. If you don't want to draw attention just opt out of the entire survey.

Re: Past names question - The only reason an employer needs to know them (once again certain government jobs excepted) is to properly check your records. If ALL of your past employers and schools (that the application asks for) have been notified of your name change and it's recorded on your record, and you have NO unsealed adult criminal history whatsoever (not even minor infractions) simply put down "none that relevant records would be under" or something similar (beyond the trans* community I suggest this to those who had a name change due to adoption or other reasons as a child - although you typically don't even need to bring it up if you're worried you can use an "alternative" response like the one given). Unfortunately, if they need to know the former name to properly verify past employment or education you'd have to bring it up unless you want a false negative - and if they do a criminal records check and they don't see your full criminal history because you didn't list the name it was under you can get in trouble (another alternate idea here is to say you'll give the sensitive information straight to the agency doing the check).

(All this assumes a job in the U.S.)

[Releca]

Thanks that helps ease my might a bit. I used to have a different last name so I understand the process but didn't know you could put down you would report directly to the agency that is doing the checking.

My current job supports the local lgbt community here with sponsoring a float making me feel more comfortable there but the pay is crap so that's why I asked.

[tgchar21]

Thanks that helps ease my might a bit. I used to have a different last name so I understand the process but didn't know you could put down you would report directly to the agency that is doing the checking.

YMMV with such a strategy, but I've heard of others who tried it and was successful (I don't think it's an official rule anywhere in the U.S. though). The precedent about not needing to divulge names irrelevant to the record-checking process came about from foreigners who changed their names to assimilate who might be discriminated against otherwise (which could be extended to transpeople as well). (It's not simply a matter of what is or was your "legal name" - conversely if any part of your criminal history is under an alias name you'd have to indicate that for the background check or you could run into the same issues I touched on in my earlier post. Any legally changed names that your history would be under would of course also count as an alias here.)

P.S. At what point in your life was that change to your last name done, if you don't mind saying so (since that's a factor in cases like these)?

[Releca]

It was when I was still a kid. The spelling of my last name was read wrong in many cases since when my family traveled to America it was modified to how it sounded as was the custom in early American. A good chunk of my family 1 generation back and going toward recently modified it back to how it was but my mom changed it to her mothers maiden name instead so I put both down since most records before about 12 are in the old name and placed don't likely to see I was born at age 12.

Going back to my roots the name I am going back to is the original spelling before we left Germany. Still hunting down the exact dates but I've almost got my family history back to when we came to America or at least the 1700's. Still doing quite a bit of research on the matter.

[tgchar21]

It was when I was still a kid. The spelling of my last name was read wrong in many cases since when my family traveled to America it was modified to how it sounded as was the custom in early American. A good chunk of my family 1 generation back and going toward recently modified it back to how it was but my mom changed it to her mothers maiden name instead so I put both down since most records before about 12 are in the old name and placed don't likely to see I was born at age 12.

If that's the case then you really haven't had a need to mention it for job purposes, as was discussed here (unless you were going for a government security clearance). They don't care about your birth or any early childhood records - and to clarify about how typical background checks work a name change done before you were of working or high school age would not have any effect on when they would "see" that you were born. (It's a name change done after you would typically have these kinds of "adult" records that would make it look like you suddenly sprang into existence at a late age.)