What information does Equifax’s The Work Number provide to third‑party verifiers about federal employees and how to use it legally?
Executive summary
The Work Number, run by Equifax Workforce Solutions, is an automated database of employer‑reported employment and income records that supplies third‑party verifiers with personnel facts (employment status, dates, employer, income) and identity matches (name/SSN), subject to credentialing and permissible‑purpose rules under the Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA) [1] [2] [3]. Use by verifiers is legal only when they are credentialed, pay required fees, assert a permissible purpose (for example credit decisions, tenancy, government benefits, or employment verification), and follow audit, consent, and consumer‑access provisions described by Equifax [4] [3] [2].
1. What The Work Number actually supplies to verifiers
The Work Number provides employment and income information submitted by employers and payroll processors — commonly including employer name, employment status, dates of hire/termination, and payroll details such as reported salary or wages — and can confirm that an applicant‑provided name and Social Security number match employer‑provided records [1] [2] [5]. Equifax advertises instant, automated verifications 24/7 and says the database contains hundreds of millions of records and contributions from millions of employers, enabling rapid responses to lenders, property managers, and government agencies [2] [4].
2. Legal guardrails: FCRA, credentialing, permissible purpose, and consent
Access to The Work Number is governed by the FCRA: verifiers must have a permissible purpose to request data and must undergo a credentialing process before receiving access, because information from The Work Number is treated as a consumer report under the FCRA [3] [4]. For certain income details, The Work Number requires verifiers to certify they have documented the employee’s consent specific to the request, and both planned and random audits are used to enforce proper usage [4]. Equifax also states that verifiers must pay fees for requests and that transactions are tracked and auditable [4] [2].
3. What employees can do: transparency and dispute rights
Employees can request their Employment Data Report and view or manage access to their records through Equifax’s employee portal; Equifax says it will provide free reports upon request and will freeze an individual consumer report if requested, and consumers can dispute inaccuracies via the company’s employee service channels [1] [6] [5]. The Work Number also promotes audit logs and controls so employees can see who accessed their data, reflecting Equifax’s stated compliance posture under FCRA and internal security measures like encryption and multi‑factor authentication [5] [7].
4. Practical lawful use cases and limitations for federal employees
Verifiers with permissible purposes—mortgage underwriters, landlords, lenders, and some government agencies processing benefits—may legally obtain employment and income verifications about federal employees through The Work Number in the same operational way as for private employees, provided the employer contributes the data and the verifier is credentialed and compliant with FCRA rules [1] [2] [4]. The provided sources do not enumerate special legal exceptions for federal employees versus other employees, so any agency‑specific rules or privacy protections for federal personnel beyond the general FCRA/credentialing framework are not documented in the supplied reporting and cannot be asserted here [1] [3].
5. Tensions and incentives beneath the surface
Equifax frames The Work Number as a convenience and security improvement over manual verifications, citing speed, encryption, and audit controls; at the same time the service monetizes access by charging verifiers and amassing a centralized employment database, creating potential privacy and mission‑creep concerns that critics often flag though those critiques are not detailed in these sources [2] [5] [4]. The balanced takeaway in the reporting is that lawful use depends on FCRA‑defined permissible purpose, credentialing and auditability, and consumer access and dispute rights; safeguards are claimed, but the corporate revenue model and centralization of sensitive employment data are implicit incentives worth scrutiny [3] [4] [2].