Job Application - Can they do this?

lovelldr

Hi.

First off, sorry if this is the wrong forum, but I don't know where else to put it.

My partner is a teacher, and she has applied for a job at a school. The interview was this morning, and she has found this to be the perfect school for her.

When she originally applied for the job, it came through as a Permanent and Full Time job. However, in the interview, she was asked why she applied for a temporary job. As you can guess, she was quite shocked at this. When she went out, the other people there could see she was shocked, so asked why, and she said about it being temporary. They were all there because of the job being permanent!

She got home, and looked at the printout from the eteach website, and it says on there that it is a permanent, full-time job. However, when she was at the school, apparantly the office said that she logged on to e-teach, and it showed that it said nothing about it being permanent.

Are they able to suddenly turn round and change it so that it is temporary, without warning the applicants? Or, should they not check that the advertisement is actually correct (i.e. it showed temporary on the advert?).

She is currently in a dilemma as to whether she takes the job if offered, or to decline it without the security of it being permanent? (it might be offered to extend or make permanent, but we're unsure).

Can anyone help out with this please? As soon as possible please, as she is waiting to hear about the interview as to whether she has the job...

Thanks a lot guys

Wyndham

I don't think it is illegal, because the advert is an invitation to apply only. If they made her an offer then changed it, it would be different. But as she isn't committed at this stage, then yes, I think they can do it.

Bad practice though!

weejock_2

The job advertisement actually forms the contract between the employer and the employee. However, if the school can make this sort of faux pais, does she really want to work for them? There could also have been a problem with budget and headcount do someone has forgotten to change the website. To show temerity and challenge them.

lovelldr

Wyndham wrote: »

I don't think it is illegal, because the advert is an invitation to apply only. If they made her an offer then changed it, it would be different. But as she isn't committed at this stage, then yes, I think they can do it.

Bad practice though!

But surely, it is mis-advertising isn't it?

Just like in supermarkets, if they sell products at lower prices, they would be done by trading standards. They either have to honour the prices or remove the item from sale. Wouldn't something like that be the case in this case? Either offer the post as permanent, or re-advertise it as temporary???

dmg24

The job advertisement actually forms the contract between the employer and the employee.

That is nonsense.

Wyndham is spot on, the advertisement is purely an invitation to teach. If it was an offer, then it would be capable of acceptance by everyone, and then you would have the situation of multiple people accepting one post!

Unfortunately, this just appears to be an error.

dmg24

lovelldr wrote: »

But surely, it is mis-advertising isn't it?

Just like in supermarkets, if they sell products at lower prices, they would be done by trading standards. They either have to honour the prices or remove the item from sale. Wouldn't something like that be the case in this case? Either offer the post as permanent, or re-advertise it as temporary???

If the error was intentional, then it would be something to report to the LEA. But I do imagine that it was an unintentional administrative error. Sadly, these things happen.

alanobrien

incompetence isn't illegal if it was the whole government would be locked up.

Its just an unfortunate clerical error from the sound of it.

lovelldr

But doesn't the school have an obligation to check the adverts they put out?

I know that where I work, if they advertise jobs, they check out all of the adverts and ensure they are correct. If they were incorrect, they would then explain to the candidate the errors... There were quite a lot of people go for these interviews, some travelling at least 50 miles. When they found out the job was only temporary, they were thoroughly annoyed!

Sorry if this is sounding like I'm getting annoyed with any of you personally, but I am just explaining the annoyance! She had built up her expectations, was really satisfied with the interview, was really satisfied with the school itself, and now has to forget all that because of an error, which if they'd have actually looked at the advert and explained the sitation to everyone, could've been avoided...

Idiophreak

What do you want them to do? They can't really take on more permanent teachers than they have budget(or classes) for....It's annoying, sure, and if deliberate it's pretty poor form...but not much can be done in any case...

lovelldr

Idiophreak wrote: »

What do you want them to do? They can't really take on more permanent teachers than they have budget(or classes) for....It's annoying, sure, and if deliberate it's pretty poor form...but not much can be done in any case...

I would want them to have actually checked what they'd sent out in the first place. Even if it's not deliberate, surely they would've know that they made a c0ck-up by just reading through their own adverts (something which I'd have thought everyone who placed an advert would do).

Also, there surely is enough budget, because if a teacher leaves, then who else is going to take on the class. Of course there is always going to be a budget for that class. And to help the case for them being able to order correctly according to budget, they placed the Foundation Stage Teaching post as temporary, which is what you would expect for foundation stage, because they said it was temporary in case they didn't get enough intake for foundation...

squashy

What if it is just covering for maternity leave or a teacher taking a sabbatical?

It is just down to an admin error, things like this happen. Bad luck to your friend though.