Home : Newsletters 2002 : November
The future of online recruitment and the Employment Agencies Act
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Home : Newsletters : 2002 : November
The future of online recruitment and the Employment Agencies Act
The Association of Online Recruiters (AOLR www.aolr.org)
have been working hard on behalf of the online recruitment industry in
order to try to ensure that forthcoming amendments to the Employment Agencies
Act do not have an adverse effect on job boards and the online recruitment
industry as a whole.
The Government are aiming to tighten legislation governing employment
agencies. This is against a background of several incidents related to
recruitment agencies. A good example of these incidents was the court
case involving Amy Gehring, the supply teacher sourced by a recruitment
agency, who was tried and acquitted of having sex with underage pupils
at her school. After the trial the spotlight fell on the agency involved
and questions were asked as to whether the agency could have done more
to verify the candidate’s suitability for the position. The agency
had even gone as far as ignoring warnings from the police and the Child
Protection Agency that the agency’s candidate might be a danger
to children.
Under amendments to the legislation recruitment agencies will be required
to have face to face meetings with all candidates and obtain copies of
all qualifications listed on candidate CV’s. In principle this seems
a practical, if time consuming, way of ensuring recruitment agencies properly
verify the suitability and qualifications of their candidates.
Potential problems for the online recruitment industry arise because
under the legislation the definition of recruitment agencies is so broad
that it also includes job boards. This means that online recruitment sites
would also be obliged to undertake the new requirements regarding candidate
verification. This would obviously be impossible for job boards due to
the volume of users they attract, for example Fish4Jobs, GoJobsite and
Total Jobs all attract over half a million unique users each month (NORAS
/ E ABC).
Under the legislation newspapers carrying recruitment advertising, such
as the Guardian, are exempt from such obligations, although job boards
operated by newspapers are not exempt.
If this new legislation were to be implemented then the future for the
UK online recruitment industry would be bleak. The legislation only effects
operations based in the UK so a possible consequence would be UK job boards
relocating overseas and operating regional offices in the UK. The worst-case
scenario however is the closure of UK job boards and the collapse of online
recruitment in the UK.
This worst-case scenario seems unlikely. Alan Johnson MP, the Minister
for Employment Relations, Industry and the Regions, wrote in a letter
to Personnel Today in 5th November “…our aim is not to damage
internet job boards, but to protect job seekers and employers from unscrupulous
agencies”. To ensure that this does not happen Bill Shipton, Chairman
of the AOLR has been working in conjunction with the Department of Trade
and Industry to agree a mutually acceptable definition of job boards.
This definition could then be used by the DTI to categorise businesses
and grant exemption from the legislation to appropriate businesses.
Love them or loath them, job boards are fundamentally important to the
UK online recruitment industry. We should support the AOLR in the work
they are doing to ensure that common sense prevails in relation to the
classification of job boards under the employment agencies act. Job boards
that are not currently members of the AOLR should be encouraged to join.
Membership of the AOLR can offer advertisers the necessary reassurance
regarding the ethical practices of job boards and a strong AOLR, with
an increased membership, could greatly benefit the online recruitment
industry as a whole.
Home : Newsletters : 2002 : November
The future of online recruitment and the Employment Agencies Act
The Association of Online Recruiters (AOLR www.aolr.org) have been working hard on behalf of the online recruitment industry in order to try to ensure that forthcoming amendments to the Employment Agencies Act do not have an adverse effect on job boards and the online recruitment industry as a whole.
The Government are aiming to tighten legislation governing employment agencies. This is against a background of several incidents related to recruitment agencies. A good example of these incidents was the court case involving Amy Gehring, the supply teacher sourced by a recruitment agency, who was tried and acquitted of having sex with underage pupils at her school. After the trial the spotlight fell on the agency involved and questions were asked as to whether the agency could have done more to verify the candidate’s suitability for the position. The agency had even gone as far as ignoring warnings from the police and the Child Protection Agency that the agency’s candidate might be a danger to children.
Under amendments to the legislation recruitment agencies will be required to have face to face meetings with all candidates and obtain copies of all qualifications listed on candidate CV’s. In principle this seems a practical, if time consuming, way of ensuring recruitment agencies properly verify the suitability and qualifications of their candidates.
Potential problems for the online recruitment industry arise because under the legislation the definition of recruitment agencies is so broad that it also includes job boards. This means that online recruitment sites would also be obliged to undertake the new requirements regarding candidate verification. This would obviously be impossible for job boards due to the volume of users they attract, for example Fish4Jobs, GoJobsite and Total Jobs all attract over half a million unique users each month (NORAS / E ABC).
Under the legislation newspapers carrying recruitment advertising, such as the Guardian, are exempt from such obligations, although job boards operated by newspapers are not exempt.
If this new legislation were to be implemented then the future for the UK online recruitment industry would be bleak. The legislation only effects operations based in the UK so a possible consequence would be UK job boards relocating overseas and operating regional offices in the UK. The worst-case scenario however is the closure of UK job boards and the collapse of online recruitment in the UK.
This worst-case scenario seems unlikely. Alan Johnson MP, the Minister for Employment Relations, Industry and the Regions, wrote in a letter to Personnel Today in 5th November “…our aim is not to damage internet job boards, but to protect job seekers and employers from unscrupulous agencies”. To ensure that this does not happen Bill Shipton, Chairman of the AOLR has been working in conjunction with the Department of Trade and Industry to agree a mutually acceptable definition of job boards. This definition could then be used by the DTI to categorise businesses and grant exemption from the legislation to appropriate businesses.
Love them or loath them, job boards are fundamentally important to the UK online recruitment industry. We should support the AOLR in the work they are doing to ensure that common sense prevails in relation to the classification of job boards under the employment agencies act. Job boards that are not currently members of the AOLR should be encouraged to join. Membership of the AOLR can offer advertisers the necessary reassurance regarding the ethical practices of job boards and a strong AOLR, with an increased membership, could greatly benefit the online recruitment industry as a whole.
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