Declaring a disability when applying for jobs?

[alloalloallo]

My teenaged daughter has Tourette’s

She’s currently looking for a part time/summer job and has mostly been looking at KP/washing up/food prep/clearing tables type work - we live in a tourist area so lots of work available and lots of owners of hospitality businesses complaining they can’t get staff

She’s always felt more comfortable if people know in advance that she has Tourette’s, so has been adding a little covering letter explaining.

So far, however, she’s just been getting rejections without an interview as “nothing suitable available”, I suspect due to the Tourette’s.

I’ve suggested she leave off the bit about her Tourette’s, if she gets an interview then she can explain, or wait until the interview and talk to them in person.

She’s deliberately applying for kitchen/back room type stuff rather than customer facing roles anyway

Thanks

Wait until the interview.

She shouldn’t have to but wait until interview and she can explain better and they can see how it would work. I know someone who has this and of course customer face would be very challenging given how it affects them.

Any chance of work exp or offering to do trial shifts? If she’s prepared to say I prove how good I am first and how we can get around any issues it may work. Though of course it is disappointing when people would rather not make the effort and employ non disabled people. But as a Disabled adult I would be fool pretend that discrimination doesn’t exist in 2021.

Thanks!

She’s always preferred to let people know in advance so she doesn’t have to explain, she gets a little bit anxious and worries about what they might say, but I don’t think it does her any favours.

She’s not even getting an interview.

I think she should leave it off her initial application and see how it goes from there. If she gets an interview she can talk about how she would make it work, offer to do a trial shift and stuff like that, but at the moment, they’re just not giving her a chance.

Thanks!

Scope charity also have lots of good advice for Disabled people with job hunting and confidence and the like. Not sure how helpful with her age but worth having all the help and support you can find.

www.scope.org.uk/advice-and-support/work-careers/applying-for-job/

Thank you!

So, she sent an application off yesterday without mentioning her Tourette’s.

This morning, she’s had an email inviting her in for an interview.

Fingers crossed for her everyone deserve chance for a job. Let us know what happens.

Really good news.

Just remind her that employers are not allowed to discriminate on the basis of disability, sadly a lot do. They will have to make reasonable adjustments if needed.

Thank you.

She’s applied for a few more jobs since removing the Tourette’s from her CV and has been invited for interviews - plus she having a trial in a tea shop today

She did inform the place where she’s having the trial in advance, but with the others she’s not mentioned it until the interview

We’ll see how she gets on 🤞

I guess I can understand that for things like waitressing, people might be a bit cautious but generally she’s applying for stuff like washing up and clearing tables. When she’s focussed on something, her tics subside.