External Vacancy, Internal Candidate

[CornishPasty]

Good morning, all.

I suspect this will be a fairly easy question for someone to answer.

Can an employee of a business currently on probation, apply for a vacancy within the same company that has been advertised externally following a failed internal recruitment campaign?

I understand that said employee couldn't apply as an internal candidate, but cannot understand why he/she wouldn't be allowed to apply when the role went external?

Thanks,

[CornishPasty]

Apologies for the bizarre formatting...... Don't know what has happened there.

[Amethyst]

I don't see why not, although if they already applied for the job internally and didn't get it, it's unlikely they'd get it by applying through the external appplication process. Likely to be company policy if they have said you can't reapply.

[CornishPasty]

Hi there. Thanks for the response. No application was made internally as a six month exclusion applies to applying for internal vacancies. Which is fair enough.

No internal candidates were successful so it went external.

[ULA]

Just a thought on this subject there may be a valid reason why the company does not want "internal" candidate moving to new jobs within six months of being recruited into the company. It is very time consuming to induct a new member of staff into a job and if that happens within 6 months because the person moves internally this can be very disruptive.

So by all means apply but be prepared that even if you respond to the external recruitment campaign you may still be viewed as an internal candidate.

[CornishPasty]

Just a thought on this subject there may be a valid reason why the company does not want "internal" candidate moving to new jobs within six months of being recruited into the company. It is very time consuming to induct a new member of staff into a job and if that happens within 6 months because the person moves internally this can be very disruptive.

So by all means apply but be prepared that even if you respond to the external recruitment campaign you may still be viewed as an internal candidate.

Hi there. Thanks for this.

While I appreciate the response, I'm not sure it is really a legal one. There are many valid reasons why companies do not wish employees to do various things.... but the law protects the employee's right to do them anyway!

Can company policy really prevent one from applying for an external vacancy, open to all and sundry, because they don't want to have to have to train someone else new?

[2222]

Hi there. Thanks for this.

While I appreciate the response, I'm not sure it is really a legal one. There are many valid reasons why companies do not wish employees to do various things.... but the law protects the employee's right to do them anyway!

Can company policy really prevent one from applying for an external vacancy, open to all and sundry, because they don't want to have to have to train someone else new?

No, they can't prevent you applying. However, they can lawfully discriminate against you on the basis that you are an internal candidate. Only some sorts of discrimination are unlawful. They could not discriminate against you on grounds of race, for example.

So, if they don't want you to apply, they can decide to ignore your application, and that's perfectly legal. There is probably a lot of work involved in making the application, and you could be wasting your time and effort.

i would only make the application if you have discussed it beforehand with your manager and have their blessing.

[D_Pappa]

To echo the above comments:

Of course the employer can exclude employees from applying to an externally advertised role.

Most employers would advertise internally first (as they did), or internally and externally alongside each other, but there is likely to be a reason why they are seeking an external candidate.

It sounds like you're pointing towards the fact that the the employer is discriminating against the said employee, by not allowing them to be selected for an externally advertised role. And you're right, they are - and they can! So long as they are not discriminating against someone with a protected characteristic (under the Equality Act 2010), they're pretty safe.

As with many aspects of employment law, any claim that what is being done is discriminatory or wrong in some way would likely have the option of 'objective justification' as a defence, and it is likely that the employer would be able to set out a fair case for why they would exclude an internal applicant from applying to an external role.

Someone in a job for 6 months needs to be quite careful, to be honest. This person could apply for the role, but it is likely that their application would be rejected and they would have put a spotlight (not in a good way) on themselves. An employee who doesn't have 2 years service is unable to claim for unfair dismissal, only wrongful dismissal. I would encourage the employee to be mindful of that.