Reed want to see my husband's bank statements 😩

[Weepingwillowtree]

Desperate to get back into the workplace after 10 years out being a SAHM. Plucked up the courage to go for a Reed interview for a teaching assistant job (no qualifications required even though I have a BSc). Was told I had too much of a gap in my CV and they would need to see my husbands bank statements to “prove that I had been supported by him during this time”. I feel this is a total invasion of our privacy, what has my husbands finances got to do with whether or not I am capability of being a teaching assistant?? Am I being completely unreasonable refusing to provide this? They said they can’t give me a job unless I show his bank statements 😩

I'm beginning to think that certain posters here are scriptwriters trying to invent ever more byzantine reasons to justify the unjustifiable.

@PurpleWh1teGreen

The job is a Teaching Assistant at a primary school. The appointing manager/head needs to be satisfied that any gaps in the OPs CV are adequately explained as part of safer recruitment.

No one needs to start an AC12 level enquiry. A reference will do.

Incorrect. There is no job. The checks are made to enrol with an agency who will put you forward for any number of roles down the line if you ask them to. Once they have made these checks then they are not made again, not by any school who decides they'll have you for a while through the agency. All you do is carry your verifying documents with you in case they ask. This is why schools use agencies, because the compliance checks, which take some time, are pre done. And this is why agencies have to go into such depth as if errors are made, not only can that one person not work for them, but they also stand to lose all future business with the school where it is discovered. The compliance teams for the larger agencies are actually fronted by qualified legal experts, and so they will be asking for similar standards of proof that you might see eg in a court of law. And if you are in court and told "prove it" then you're not going to faff about saying "ooo, no, it's private" are you? Suggesting "a reference will do" does not recognise the role of an agency at all.

It is not down to an employment agency to investigate tax evasion!

My employer knows that what they pay me is totally insufficient to cover my lifestyle. They see the clothes I wear, the car I drive, the things I do but it is none of their business how I fund my lifestyle (my husband funds it) so long as my enhanced DBS is clean and I do my job correctly.

“OP is required to submit own bank statements as standard compliance and verification. No she doesn’t, not as part of a DBS check, and not to register with an employment agency On bank statements there is a series of irregular incoming payments of unknown provenance. This is a red flag. OP could be working cash in hand, money laundering, whatever. So they question it, and OP says "my husband has been supporting me".
If your job is compliance you need to go further and say "ah, ok. Well we need evidence of this. We need to see the same amounts going out of husband's statement". This level of investigation satisfies in the same way as a pay slip.” Reed’s job is not compliance. They are an employment agency. This is not their role

I’ll tell you what MrMucker. I’m getting strong tax evasion vibes from you post. Could you DM me you last ten years of bank statements, tax returns, and payslips? And ai also suspect you are claiming benefits you aren’t entitled to, so I’d like access to your medical records. I promise if I find any evidence of wrongdoing, I’ll forward it to the relevant authorities.

Does that sound totally fine to you, or am I overstepping a bit? Sure if you’ve got nothing to hide, you don’t mind sharing your financial records with randoms on the internet, or with random employees of an agency your wife is trying to sign up with?

MrMucker

But the job Weepingwillowtree is going for is a TA not compliance.

The compliance argument doesn’t hold up though.
If there were a few payments from a company would that company be asked to show its bank statements.
If I regularly return items from M&S would o have to get M&S’s bank statements to show I had returned items to that value.
I have had jobs where I take cash that gets put in my account. I don’t know who has given me the money and I certainly wouldn’t think they could give me access to their bank statements even if I could trace them.

If this thread keeps going, some posters are going to end up in Australia ...

@LadyDanburysCane

It is not down to an employment agency to investigate tax evasion!

My employer knows that what they pay me is totally insufficient to cover my lifestyle. They see the clothes I wear, the car I drive, the things I do but it is none of their business how I fund my lifestyle (my husband funds it) so long as my enhanced DBS is clean and I do my job correctly.

Of course it isn't. You're right. It is HMRC who investigate tax evasion. But one strand of the agency processes pay roll, and this is particularly complex if they have somebody in multiple places of work, and you need to do this correctly in terms of first job/main job/second job/self employed etc. Unfortunately OP is preceded by a history of all sorts of people turning to agencies when they cannot get other work, and also people who use agencies to boost income but without declaring other work in any form. And so it means that their payroll department come under more scrutiny from HMRC as a likely place to detect fraud. There are three or four major agencies in education who all respond to this by ramping up compliance requirements because they have to be seen to do so. And there are literally hundreds of other cowboy agencies who come and go and crumble after a few months or a couple of years. They don't do the same checks, they don't carry the same reputation, they don't thrive as businesses.

Well this is getting entertaining. Jed Mecurrio will be glad of the inspiration for new drama I'm sure.

I should add, in case anybody still thinks I am employed by Reed, that when I went through their compliance I was tearing my hair out at one point. I had to give all the postcodes of places I have EVER worked at.
I am in my early fifties, ffs. I've had at least fifty piddly little jobs in one way or another in my lifetime!
Then when they spotted a month or so of non employment when I was travelling, I had to give the names of the airport and the type of ticket I had, who I stayed with...ach, it went on and on.
Then I heard squat from them for about two months, constantly thinking they were trying to investigate me for I don't know what.
Then a flurry of congratulatory emails for joining them. Tada!
Perhaps it's easier to join MI6, dunno.
I am now rarely without work and I will never have to fill in application forms again as long as I am happy temping. So it worked out to be worth it.
It's not worth getting outraged at something that is designed to lead to better things.

@MrMucker

Why have you decided the Ops husband transfers funds into her account? She has never said that.

And Reed must check for tax evasion during her employment with them. They have no responsibility for the previous decade.

If Ops husband has been paying a mortgage, bills and weekly Tesco delivery, with no transfers to Ops own bank account, then are you saying Reed wouldn’t be entitled to see his statements any more?

Because I’m not sure how you made the leap to lump sums being deposited into her account from what has actually been said.

[quote Mmn654123]@MrMucker

Why have you decided the Ops husband transfers funds into her account? She has never said that.

And Reed must check for tax evasion during her employment with them. They have no responsibility for the previous decade.

If Ops husband has been paying a mortgage, bills and weekly Tesco delivery, with no transfers to Ops own bank account, then are you saying Reed wouldn’t be entitled to see his statements any more?

Because I’m not sure how you made the leap to lump sums being deposited into her account from what has actually been said.[/quote]
I'm sorry you have not read my post/s correctly.
It's not a leap, it is simply an example.
This is not about entitlement to see stuff, it is about OP being required to prove stuff.
Who knows how the conversation went with her and them before their request.
I'm sorry , but you need to read more carefully, I haven't made any assumptions at all, only possible scenarios and possible explanations.

@MrMucker

I should add, in case anybody still thinks I am employed by Reed, that when I went through their compliance I was tearing my hair out at one point. I had to give all the postcodes of places I have EVER worked at. I am in my early fifties, ffs. I've had at least fifty piddly little jobs in one way or another in my lifetime! Then when they spotted a month or so of non employment when I was travelling, I had to give the names of the airport and the type of ticket I had, who I stayed with...ach, it went on and on. Then I heard squat from them for about two months, constantly thinking they were trying to investigate me for I don't know what. Then a flurry of congratulatory emails for joining them. Tada! Perhaps it's easier to join MI6, dunno. I am now rarely without work and I will never have to fill in application forms again as long as I am happy temping. So it worked out to be worth it. It's not worth getting outraged at something that is designed to lead to better things.

Lol. You need to show less for naturalisation

@MrMucker

I should add, in case anybody still thinks I am employed by Reed, that when I went through their compliance I was tearing my hair out at one point. I had to give all the postcodes of places I have EVER worked at. I am in my early fifties, ffs. I've had at least fifty piddly little jobs in one way or another in my lifetime! Then when they spotted a month or so of non employment when I was travelling, I had to give the names of the airport and the type of ticket I had, who I stayed with...ach, it went on and on. Then I heard squat from them for about two months, constantly thinking they were trying to investigate me for I don't know what. Then a flurry of congratulatory emails for joining them. Tada! Perhaps it's easier to join MI6, dunno. I am now rarely without work and I will never have to fill in application forms again as long as I am happy temping. So it worked out to be worth it. It's not worth getting outraged at something that is designed to lead to better things.

No what you have experienced is individuals creating work for themselves.

The do more and more and more even though it is both unnecessary and potentially not even legal (as in the Ops case) and then the hourly rate the schools pay goes up and up and up - because that’s what happens when nobody challenges the crazy!

Because you diligently faffed about finding old postcode and checking airline tickets, the system hasn’t changed. Maybe you should have taken a stand instead? The level of checks they did on you were excessive - although at least they were about you. How would you feel if they had demanded to know all your partners previous employers postcodes and travel history? Still ok for you? Where is the line? Would you tell them about your children? Your parents? What would it take for you to say ‘hang on, this is bonkers’?

Surely a DBS check would show if OP had a prison record.

And OP's HMRC account would show that she had no earnings from an employment she wasn't disclosing.

PAYE records are submitted each month - so HMRC can quickly identify if OP was working 2 (or more) jobs and adjust tax code accordingly.

Reed are way overstepping here.

@MrMucker
But your made up examples don’t make any sense. It’s not their business how she’s supported herself during her years as a SAHM. Their business is only whether she’s entitled to work in the UK, ensuring she pays tax on her income during her employment and is appropriately experienced for the roles they offer her. If they wanted confirmation she was a SAHM they could have asked for her children’s birth certificates but frankly there is no requirement to verify that.

I haven’t read your post incorrectly at all. It can never be acceptable to require someone to offer up a third parties finance statements. You have come up with examples that don’t make any sense at all.

@Schoolchoicesucks

Surely a DBS check would show if OP had a prison record.

And OP's HMRC account would show that she had no earnings from an employment she wasn't disclosing.

PAYE records are submitted each month - so HMRC can quickly identify if OP was working 2 (or more) jobs and adjust tax code accordingly.

Reed are way overstepping here.

Exactly so!

@Weepingwillowtree Let’s all boycott Reed and tell them why

Just apply to schools directly or join a different agency that’s education specific

It will be because you want to work in education. When you apply to work in a school you cannot have any unaccounted gaps so it would make sense to ask to prove to show you weren't up to anything nefarious.

How will her dh's statements show she was or wasn't up to something nefarious?

Don’t work with these idiots. What do they think? You’ve been a SAHM/cocaine dealer for ten years.

Send them a receipt for tampons instead for a laugh.

@Vgbeat So how do her husbands bank accounts prove that?

@Vgbeat

It will be because you want to work in education. When you apply to work in a school you cannot have any unaccounted gaps so it would make sense to ask to prove to show you weren't up to anything nefarious.

And how would a bank statement showing that her husband paid a mortgage, utilities and a weekly food deliver ‘prove’ that the op wasn’t up to something nefarious?

She could have been in prison while he paid the bills. Or she could have been off robbing a bank and taking regular trips to Thailand to spend her ill gotten gains.

What would looking at someone else’s bank account tell them about the Ops life?

Ask them where in their data handling assessment it entitles them to handle data from your husband in your job request also log this as a dire t complaint to the ICO. Sound more like they are being nosey and legally they can only handle data they need to by lasw and I can't see this being included. You aren't applying for finance or having to prove anything for benefits so I'd explain that you have refferred their request to the ICO as you have genuine concerns about the potential that their request for such data may be unlawful and that others may have fallen victim to this type of request. Also if you have written proof that they requested this and stated that you won't have a job with them without this then you should have grounds for an employment tribunal based on the fact that they won't hire undue to an illegal request for data that is not yours and therefore have turned down your employment unlawfully. Then it's all based on whatever evidence you have that they requested that and whether the ICO determine whether that's legal or not which is almost guaranteed that it's not.

Sounds like a misinformed or rogue employee at Reed. This is definitely wrong. I would put it on Twitter and tag them if I were you and maybe take it to your local paper.