FOI Request Employment Referencing

Request 101001452049

1. Which department/person(s) deals with Employment References at your organisation and what is the name of the Head of Department?
2. What is the average hourly rate of the person(s) dealing with Job References? (If outsourced, how much do you pay annually for this service?)
3. How are Employment References requested for new starters?  How are they chased up? (email/telephone/postal service/fax)
4. How are Employment References completed for ex-employees (email/telephone/postal service/fax)?
5. How many hours (on average) does your company (or the outsourced company) spend, each month, requesting employment references for new candidates?
6. How many hours (on average) does your company (or the outsourced company) spend, each month, chasing up employment references for new candidates?
7. How many hours (on average) does your company spend (or the outsourced company), each month, completing employment references for former employees?
8. How many leavers (on average) does your company have per month?
9. How many new starters (on average) does your company have per month?
10. How many staff does your organisation employ at the moment?

Response 03-04-2017

1. HR deal with referring up to and including Grade 9.  Departments deal with referencing for Grade 9 and above.

2. Primarily a Clerical role – average £8.69 per hour (middle of grade).

3.References are requested via Talentlink or by letter if no email address is available.  Outstanding references are chased by the department.

4. Returned as per the format they come in, usually postal or emailed.

5-7. Cannot answer as this information is not recorded so it is therefore exempt under Section 17 of the Freedom of Information (Scotland) Act 2002- information not held.  

8.Turnover statistics used for workforce profiling for the year to 1 November 2016 showed 380 leavers (so an average of approximately 31 leavers per month) and an annual turnover of 8%.

9. Staff can be recruited to new posts from out with or within the Council, and we do not differentiate between them. 

10. As per workforce profiling, there were 4911 employees as at 1 November 2016, and 4959 as at 1 November 2015.