Yes, Home Depot does hire felons. Several factors including how old your felony is, the type of felony and the location of the store your applying at will determine if you are eligible to be hired. Sex offenses and violent felonies will disqualify you being hired by Home Depot.

Does Home Depot Hire Felons

As stated above Home Depot will hire felons but that does not mean they will hire ALL felons.  Our Organization Help for Felons has worked with a number of felons that have been hired by Home Depot. I do not consider them to be a true “felon friendly” employer since they are very selective, but it is possible to get hired.

Below you will find truly helpful information (no fluff or BS) that will give you a an advantage when trying to get hired by Home Depot.

Guide: How to get hired by Home Depot with a felony

Following this guide will allow you to have the best shot at getting the hired. Please read the entire article before you start the process of applying.

Step #1 – Applying to home depot as a felon

Home Depot has an easy to fill out online application. It is important to note the application does not ask about felonies or criminal records. That is because home depot is a “ban the box” company. Don’t get me wrong home depot will be doing a background check on you after your interview. More on that later. Let us deal with the application first.

Availability

Having open availability will make you more desirable to Home Depot. If other applicants do not have open availability you will have one up on them. Here are the questions that they ask on the application concerning availability.

Position Selection

Since the odds are already stacked against you do not make it harder than it already is by applying for a position where your felony makes it even harder or impossible. Make the name of the game “getting your foot in the door.” Do not apply for management positions or security positions since this will even call more attention to your felony conviction. After you get hired you can then apply for those positions internally.

Here are some of the easiest position to get with a felony:

• Cashier – “Provide fast, friendly customer service at the point of purchase, accurately processing checkout and return transactions and identifying selling opportunities.”
• Store Support – “Improve customer experiences beyond our front doors, loading products into vehicles and monitoring shopping carts in our parking lots.”
• Receiving – “Our Freight Team works to ensure stores are stocked and ready for business. Responsible for unloading trucks and moving material through the store, they are an integral part of our business and the customer retail experience. The majority of these positions are overnight.”

Step #2 – The interview

This is going to be the opportunity that you use to try and get your felony out of the way. Keep in mind that Home Depot knows nothing about your criminal record at this point, they never asked on the application. Your background check be the last thing that Home Depot does before you start your job.

Crazy as this sounds you are going to bring up your felony to the hiring manager that is interviewing you. Why? Because this is the only time you will have any control over explaining your felony. If you leave the interview and the hiring manager gets a “surprise, felony record” fax a week later from the background check company they will be much more apt to cut you than if it is not a surprise and they know your history.

How to present you felony to the Home Depot interviewer

There are some things you can do to explain your felony in a way that makes it sound “softer” to the Home Depot interviewer. You must be prepared to present your felony to the interviewer both orally and in written form. Here are the details.

Explaining your felony to the Home Depot hiring manager

• Timing is everything – Do not bring this up until the interview is almost concluded, but not after it has ended. This allows the interviewer to form a good opinion about you before you bring up the bad news. Nine times out of ten towards the end of the interview the hiring manager will ask you if you have any questions. This is the time to let them know about your criminal record. Do not use the word felony yet.
• Explain your felony – Now everyone’s story is different so some variation may be needed for your situation. You need to explain in brief how you got in trouble and what happened. Be brief and do not dwell on this part. Limit this to a minute or less.
• Explain what you have done since your felony – This is especially important and should be well thought out. Talk about what you have done to change your life including but not limited to; education, classes, skills gained, lessons learned and how you want to continue your life by finding a home at Home Depot. Keep the attention on the present and not the past.
• Final note – After you have done your explaining it is time to ask the interviewer if they have any questions. After the interview is concluded thank them for their time.

Make sure that you are sincere and honest throughout the entire interview. Many hiring managers have years of experience interviewing applicants and they easily pick up on when people are trying to snowball them. Do not do it. Be calm and truthful.

Written Explanation

It is important to have a short letter concerning your felony. Keep it brief and to the point and do not provide too many details. The most important part of this is not the letter but what goes with it.

Attached to the letter provide any awards, certifications, diplomas, and a few letters of reference attesting to your character. After you have explained your felony to the interviewer then give them the letter and attached documents.

Here is an excellent video about interviewing with a felony.

Location matters

The Location of the Home Depot store that you are applying to will make a big difference since some states have laws limiting how far back, they can check your background. If you live in one of these states, you may want to dig deeper into the specifics of your state laws. If you find that your felony is old enough then you may want to rethink telling your interviewer about your felony conviction.

Twelve states do not allow any felony conviction information older than seven years to be reported. The seven years starts from your release date in most states.

• California
• Colorado*
• Kansas*
• Maryland*
• Massachusetts
• Montana
• Nevada
• New Hampshire*
• New York *
• Texas *
• Washington*

(* exceptions based on pay/salary)

You can find more information on 7-year background check states here.

Home Depot interview Information

Home Depot is going to ask you a lot of questions regarding customer service situations. You can find more information about Home Depot interview questions here. The top three questions asked are as follows:

• If a customer is looking for a part but doesn’t know what it’s called, how would you figure out what they needed?
• How would you define exceptional customer service?
• If a customer’s card was declined, and they became upset, how would you handle the situation?

Home Depot background information

When you go for your interview you need to known a bit about the company.

Home Depot is the largest home improvement chain in the United States, even bigger than Lowes. They sell everything from shingles, lumber, plywood, screws, lighting, plumbing and electrical supplies. Home Depot values include “taking care of our people”, excellent customer service and respect for all among other things. The about us page has some helpful information also.