Expert: Eric Potts - 4/18/2009

Question
Hi, my fiance just turned in his application and I had a couple of questions about disqualifications. He has no criminal record, poor credit(about $3000 of debt)only because we have four sons and not enough income to pay them off, he had his license suspended in February of 2007 for a lapsed insurance card (which was because we only pay our insurance once a year and had moved forgetting to update our address information with the insurance company, he has only had 2 accidents and the last one was about 4 years ago....do you think any of these minor things will take him out of the running? Oh, this is for a city in New Jersey:)

Answer
Hi Laura,

Different Departments look at different things when hiring Police Officers...some put a higher premium on certain things while to other departments those things might not be as important.

As you might know from my profile, I work in NJ as a Police Officer and I can tell you that the competition in NJ to become a Police Officer is pretty stiff. Just one blemish on your record can be enough to eliminate you from contention because you are going against people who don't have those blemishes. All things being equal the unblemished record will be taken before the blemished record. That isn't to say there is no hope. I would advise your Fiance to work hard at clearing up the debt and improve your credit, these are factors that are looked at during a background investigation. He certainly needs to be able to explain the license suspension and have proof at the ready when asked for it. Take care of these issue, keep trying and I'm sure thinhs will work out for you in the end.

Good Luck!