To be really really annoyed at River Island's treatment of my daughter at interview

[BadHairDyeDay]

DD17 applied for a job with RI - 8 hour contract evenings and Saturdays and would fit around school no problem. On Thursday she an email asking her to attend a "recruitment event" yesterday morning at 9.30 and to bring "proof of eligibility to work in the UK". Excellent so far.
So yesterday morning DD gets her National insurance number letter and I drop her off for the interview. As I'm walking back to the car I get a phone call from DD to say she needs either her birth certificate or her passport. I ask her what for. She says she was supposed to bring either one. I said no it was proof of eligibility to work in the UK, I.e. National insurance number. Birth certificate = proof of identity. Passport = eligibility to travel outside your own country. That was problem no 1 . Anyway RI had said she could come back at 10.30 with said documents and have interview then. So I made the half hour round trip home to fetch BC.
All fine then. But no. Problem no.2. At the end of the interview DD is asked when she can work (which she had set out in detail in her application form and was the same as the advertised position). So she tells them again and they say "Oh so you can't work XX?". DD says no. They say not at all? DD says sorry no it was in my application form and I didn't think I had to! End of interview!

So AIBU to be raging that they didn't ask for the documents they actually wanted at interview and also that we completely wasted a whole morning due to the fact that they didn't read my DD's application form properly and changed the criteria at the last minute anyway!!!!!
I have a good mind to complain to head office because that's is just plain incompetence - and in their eyes my DD looks like she is in the wrong!!!

P.S Sorry this is so long!!!

Come to think of it, teen DC got jobs without producing ID (very small local employers).

Teen DD is currently struggling to get some kind of proof of recent address, though, for a DBS. Hard to produce when you don't pay own bills.

I'd be annoyed if I were OP about the hours not being anything like what was advertised. There are other employers out there, however.

Doesn't your dd get bank statements?

@MedSchoolRat GP letter is acceptable according to government

stucknoue

Providing an explanation for gaps in cv is not the same as being asked to provide references for gaps in cv.

The second is bananas.

I'd find it hard to believe but if they 'also wouldn't accept the reference of someone who was no longer at the company..' then they clearly have very peculiar practices.

I remember once having to get references for a gap, confirmation from job centre that I was signing on, can't remember what that was for now. Think I was in mid 20s and it was back to just after university or something.

I'd feel guilty asking GP to waste time writing a letter. I gather they charge up to £60 for letters. Realistically, DD would have to ask GP surgery & she would hate asking. Her NI letter was rejected (too old). My ChBen letter is also too old.

Santander don't routinely send out paper statements. I told DD if she logs into her account they may have pdf statements to print, else ask in branch. She's having mental blocks about either set of actions. I don't want to get my head bit off by making unwelcome suggestions. She's trying a recent set up your 'Internet banking' letter from Santander that might be accepted (but it looks like a cheap photocopy imho).

Anyone including immigrants with no right to remain can apply for an NI number. UK born get them when teenagers but others can apply too.

I think you and your DD have misunderstood what flexibility means when used by minimum wage employers OP. It does not mean your DD choosing when she wants to work. It means your DD being available every hour except core school hours at RI's beck and call, and she works whichever 8 hours the duty manager in charge of shift rotas chooses to give her.

Either she is grateful and cheerful about it, and once she has proved herself a good employee she might be allowed to express a preference for her ideal working times, and they may accommodate that if they like her. Flexible most definitely does not mean "tell us which weekend day and which evenings you don't have other commitments or activities and we'll give you work then"

Yabu. In fact it's a valuable lesson for your dd rather than a waste of a morning . Just a mere fact of life that for an interview you would bring several forms of ID ( even ones they didn't specify , just in case ) and also assume they have only just skimmed over your CV because , well, people are dicks .

NI numbers are not restricted to UK nationals, that's why they are not proof of nationality.

It is very easy to search online for the paperwork that is acceptable as proof of the right to work here so I do think you are being unreasonable on that front OP. You seem to have massively overreacted to the whole thing and it wasn't even your interview!

@mydogisthebest they are right about the laws changing - you need to provide proof before you start work, but that doesn't have to be at the interview stage, although it may save the employer time if you do. It used to be included in letters of appointment where I worked (large employer).

Believe it or not, it's not much fun for employers to do the Government's job of checking the right to work!

Believe it or not, it's not much fun for employers to do the Government's job of checking the right to work!

And wait for it when you will have to start checking settled and presettled statuses for EU staff🙈

What were the hours they wanted her to work but she couldn't?

When my neighbour first showed me the conditional offer for the job, I agreed with her that they'd made a mistake and said she should just provide the employment references and explain gaps in employment.

They then got back to her and clarified they needed references for that time. She then found out from someone else that they might have assumed she was on benefits and they're expecting something from the job centre and she explained she wasn't on benefits but they said they needed something to say she was doing what she said she was doing (it seemed) and no, it couldn't be from her husband.

I gave her a character reference in the end saying she sort of helped me during that time with childcare and house sitting and she's generally ace. That seemed to meet their requirements.

@MedSchoolRat I don't think they will take that tbh. I used to get stamped copy of bank statements at one point.
Then I said fuck it, because no one including gov cares that I want to be paper free so I now have everything coming in in a physical form. I have number of boxes with various paperwork and bills for last 7 years🤦

Here is gov page which says what can and cannot be used. Majority of institutions I dealt with used what's on the list. www.gov.uk/government/publications/proof-of-identity-checklist/proof-of-identity-checklist

Over reacting, I have no doubt the paperwork would have explained what she needed to take, every interview I have had has, you wrongly advised your daughter. As for the second point, I imagine they were interviewing a large number of people and didn't remember/take note of the intricacies of availability for every single candidate.

Proof of eligibility to work in the UK means passport or birth certificate if you are a UK resident. You didn't know that and are misdirecting your anger at RI rather than acknowledging your own ignorance. No biggie, lesson learned. Chill out

This, apart from the birth certificate, which definitely doesn’t confer a right to work in the UK, or even citizenship. In fact, I’m fairly sure that anyone can order a copy of anyone else’s birth certificate for around £10.

Every job I’ve had I’ve always taken passport and birth certificate. Also from my experience they ask what additional hours you can work. For example I took a weekend job at 17, and 2 weeks in it was the summer holidays and I was asked to work full time until I went back to school.

The point about address is a valid one. No one in this house gets physical bank statements any more, how many teenagers get utility bills? We have really struggled to get acceptable proof of address

You all need a foreign friend who can tell you how we do it😂
I can prove who I am (3 forms of ID, might get 4th in few years🤞), where do I live (currently have 10 acceptable proofs of address), where am I from, when was I there and there, what was I doing at majority of dates (holidays for example, I even have some old rotas), when I was working where, where was I living, that I paid bills at any given time etc.
I can prove ANYTHING anytime😂 I am the person immigration officers dream about. Not only I have everything possible, I also send it to them in labeled, taped folders so they have it easy😂

Print a colour bank statement from the internet if they need an original from the bank. They can't tell the difference.

Pease every online bank has the ability to request a paper copy statement specifically because Bank’s themselves need this to open accounts.

I’m guessing the op has never worked in retail.

As for phoning to complain on her behalf, that’s not your job, she doesn’t need you to tell tales for her.

Same as others have said birth certificate and passport is the norm when attending interviews as proof of identification

I think the only thing they did wrong was not read her application but maybe she's had a lucky escape by sounds of it

That's the thing though. Many don't have a passport or DL.

But many have one or the other. It's highly doubtful that if they launched this in the UK, it would be free of charge.

Which is why people, I assume didnt want it. If you were happy to pay for an ID, or could easily afford it. In the UK you would already have a provisional drivers licence or passport.

If this ID was free, I cant imagine that much opposition.

That's what I am saying lots of people already have ID, why would they want to pay for another? If they cant afford a passport or license, why would they want to pay for a national ID. If having an ID was so important to them and they could afford it, they would have paid for ID already.

The first I knew of it was in 2016 when I was asked to prove my right to work here when going for an interview. A poster says it came into force in 2008 but I don't know how true that is because I went for interviews with known retailers after that date and didn't get asked for any proof.

I worked at British gas in 2008. We were all asked to bring in ID to prove right to work. Before that, they took your word for it.

16 in our office turned out to be here and working illegally. Out of 200 people, 16 had lied. Clearly, just believing people because they said they could work here, didnt work.

So actually it is needed. And it's ok saying back in your day an interview was just a chat etc. However, now there is more competition for jobs. Recruiting isnt cheap and people want to ensure that they are hiring the right people.

The Asda interview for example. They wound have interview and hired loads of people who just werent right, so made their hiring stricter.

Just because something was one way, back in the day, doesnt mean it should always be that way or better when it was. It also doesnt mean it suited today's job market.

I was a manager for a well known retailer in 1999/2000. We always had to ask for passport and proof of right to work in the U.K. when taking staff on. I had to let one of my members of staff go as she was unable to provide this proof within the first 30 days of employment.