To be frustrated with HR?

I'm wondering did whoever offered you the position have the authority to do so and there's some internal wrangling going on.

Is it possible that the job is being withdrawn?

Or, someone whose signature is required to give the green light, may be on leave but they haven’t communicated this?

I was detecting some sarcasm, but maybe just me 😁

I agree the hiring manager should be chasing this up.

Wow OP, slow yourself down!!

I run several teams in HR including recruitment and kindly, they would all be fuming with you. You seem to be under the impression that you are the only person they are currently dealing with. You need to get some perspective.

Do you realise that since you returned the paperwork, last Friday lunchtime, you have sent 4 separate chaser emails in the space of 4 working days?!! I mean this kindly but that is insane behaviour and you are marking yourself out as a pain. I totally understand that you want to leave and get started but please consider the other person's own workload, your hiring managers workload and that due process takes time.

The person you are dealing with may have had a day of annual leave, not work full time, had a day or 4 of training to do - there are not sat at the end of their laptop desperately waiting to your name to pop up in their email account.

Calling due process a "mysterious ritual" is disrespectful and you are being entitled and needy. There could be any number of reasons why this is "slow" hiring manager issues, paperwork issues - we need a solid audit trail to evidence decision making the same as everyone else especially when spending the public purse. The job might no longer exist given where council budgets currently are and they are negotiating in the background....

Alternatively, the person you are dealing with might just not be very good or brand new and n training. You should give people the basic respect of assuming positive intent, they are out to sabotage you.

Chasing them on Monday after returning the paperwork Friday afternoon was so incredibly rude. Do not send any more emails or go and visit them in person as someone else has suggested!! Let them work through it and when they next email you - which they will - apologise for the excessive chasing for the sake of your current and future relationship with the HR team. You will need them in your corner one day.

Also, for the record, your notice period means jack. If the new manager wants you quickly they can and will waive it so for your own sanity stop working on fictional start dates in your head until you have all the information.

Your next step, again kindly, is to sit on your hands. Do not send another email.

Worker in HR for large organisation here. I wouldn’t email one person. They might be part time, off sick, very new to the role, on annual leave etc. Who knows what, but something is obviously going on with that person.

I would use a general email address or phone to chase up. Then another member of the team or a manager can potentially access your follow up emails and they might be more available to get your info sorted quickly!

Actually I would call them on the phone.

And good luck in your new role.

Why are people in HR like this, how hard is to to respond to an email and not be rude and just explain there are things being worked on or give OP something to go off. There clearly frustrated and confused as to the delay and rightly so.

if I didn’t push and chase my own HR I would never of sorted out my return to work from Matt leave. Once woman I know didn’t and work a whole month and HR hasn’t put her back properly oj payroll and she didn’t get paid! She was a senior manager as well.

the attitude from people who work in HR is so ridiculous. People on the other end are human and some duty of care is required towards the staff. People have there own circumstances to sort and need to be aware of dates and have important things like job changes to prepare for.

It's been 4 days. 4 days since the OP returned the paperwork. Do you respond to every email you get on the same day? If you are able to do so, I'd say you aren't busy enough.

Did you know that the SLA for responding to emails in the council is 2-5 working days depending on the department? So if we assume it's 5, the OP is not even due a response to the first email they sent until this afternoon!!! All they have managed to do is clog up and already full inbox.

It's not about "people in HR being like this" it's about people not understanding we are humans who work for complex organisations to protect the company - not the staff member.

The OPs life event is not an emergency. If they rushed and made a mistake they would be on here slating them too.

@Focussingonmeyeah: another one who thinks HR are pretty useless - it’s the same at my organisation (quasi public sector). I’ve had countless interactions with them where I’m like “God, how stupid are you?”My husband’s private sector and his HR team’s useless too.

Seems actually to be an HR trait - they want to do as little as possible and get pissed off when anyone expects anything of them.

I'm a teacher in a secondary school. I manage a house of 70 girls plus a 95% timetable. I.have to respond to all emails within 24 hours with at the very least a holding response and a proper one within 48 hours. Silence is not acceptable. Our admin / finance / hr dept are the only people who.do.not do this. Its become standard practice now for us to copy the Head into any chasing emails of we actually need them to reply. 🙄 the whole 'if you want something done give it to a busy person' seems apt. We get shit done fast so its off our plate.

I am employed in the private sector and my HR isn’t any better.

Went for internal promotion last month, had my interview which was all fine. Everything was signed off prior to that interview, so now it’s just for our HR to process. It’s meant to take effect from the 1 October, but I haven’t had a revised contract yet. I don’t even know what my new salary might be!

Just a shambles really. My manager has chased HR but they just say it’s in the process (the same mythical process as yours I suspect) so I’m just sat here just completely in the dark as the internal machinations slowly turn.

It might work better to chat to your recruiting manager and ask them to chase up

I heard of a case where a local authority HR took 3 months, and were quite bullish about it needing that much time 😳

How can a DBS take a day?

Are you on the update service, if not they take about 4 weeks.

It’s been 15 working days a lot of these departments have been cut to the bone so not necessarily slow it’s they’ve a massive workload and with kindness you won’t be a priority

I had similar but with IT. Left my freelance LA role of 22 months in Safeguarding to work on the Adoption team freelance. Told IT the week before I was transferring over, again clear DBS. Went in Monday, not set up, dedpite IT having had 6 days notice and all the paperwork sent. Tuesday not set up still. So bored, no work to do. Wednesday despite numerous calls and line manager involvement still not set up on the system. Thursday afternoon I was really peed off and bored out of my brain. Friday afternoon told them bullocks and walked out. Never regretted it.

There’s a reason most folk work in HR. They’ll say it’s about the people, it might be, but generally it’s because they generally work on a go slow.

Couple that with council mentality, and nothing gets done anytime fast (if at all!).

Just stick with it, and well done

You returned the documents on Friday and then emailed on Monday wanting to know if they had everything? And then chased again on Tuesday?

Yeah you've probably pissed them off