Civil service EO Home Office

[savethewales]

Hi,

I applied and interviewed for a job within the Civil Service at the start of November.
Checked the portal on the off chance yesterday and it’s updated from ‘interview slot booked’ to ‘application being reviewed’ with my interview scores now available.
Any idea how long it takes to get a yes/no from that point?
Scored a 4 and two 5’s on the behaviour questions and three 4’s on the strength questions.

Those are good scores, well done! Honestly there is no logic to how long it takes for offers/merit list/rejections to appear.

Was it a large recruitment campaign?

Thank you!

I suppose I can’t understand why they give you the feedback and not an answer at the same time.

It was a large rolling campaign I think :)

I know people who got all 6s and still ended up on a reserve list so I'd be quite surprised if you got through with those scores. Sorry OP

Of course it depends on how well other applicants did.

Good luck

If it’s a large rolling campaign then that’s why - they’ll be conducting a tranche of many interviews over a period of weeks and weeks and will need to rank all of the scores when they’ve concluded them to decide who they’ll offer to and who they’ll place on a merit list.

@Largethighsbadeyes I imagine it depends on the job and the role. My friend interviews for the civil service and said a 6 is somewhat rare to see; let alone a 7.

@theswoot thanks! You get to the point you’re just sick of waiting ha.

@savethewales waiting is the name of the game in the civil service, during recruitment but also even once you get in!

@savethewales I wouldn't agree with your friends experience but hopefully in your case it works out that way.

Best of luck

@Largethighsbadeyes you can only get a 4 on the strength questions but we’ll see :)

I've recently been successful in a large CS recruitment, I had 4s and 5s. So you likely stand a good chance.

Thanks for your help. What was the campaign/job?

@savethewales Government Statistical Service

I also got into the Civil Service fairly recently on a large recruitment campaign with 4s and 5s!

You’ve got every chance.

Although I will say it depends on how popular your location preference is. I know people who applied for the same campaign as me who only got reserve listed with higher scores than me as they had opted for London.

Patience is key here and buckets of it OP!
I think it was about 6 weeks before I heard the outcome, I applied as part of a large campaign, the timeline dates just kept getting put back so take those with a pinch of salt. Good luck 🤞

You could get on the reserve list & nor get a job in the time limit or get a job the next week, I got 4s & 5s from a dual internal/external recruitment got told I had made the reserve list in the morning & got a job after lunch (HMRC). I imagine the home office is desperate for staff at the moment so you might not have long to wait but don't forget you have to go through security vetting as an external candidate, where are you in the country? I know Sheffield has a very large Home Office presence.

I’m in the North East, it was a friend in Border Force who let me know about the jobs.

Patience is not my forte ha! They’ve updated the scores and not the outcome which I find frustrating but hey ho, I’ll pretend I’m super patient.

Hi @savethewales well done on your scores!
Civil Service don't take that long in my experience.
Wish you all the best in your new job x

My experience so far of large CS recruitment is that it's a slow process. I applied in September, interview in October. I was told the day after interview that I'd been successful at interview, but then waited 8 weeks to be placed with a department. It took another 2 weeks for HR to send through the vetting pack, and the security checks process can apparently take 8 weeks. I can't hand my notice in in my current job until that comes back, so that's another month. So I'm expecting it to take at least 6 months from applying for the role to being in post.

Did you find out yet OP? I'm looking at CS jobs at the moment and also heard 4s and 5s are good scores. Good luck!

Can you give any advice on how you find out if it’s a large recruitment drive?

Desperate for a CS job and they are recruiting in my area. Finding the applications really difficult after being in media for twenty years, I’ve never done applications like these before!

All advice pathetically gratefully received.

You can tell by the number of roles. I started in February and there was 100 roles split across 4 locations, all working for the same department but different jobs depending on the location. I think anything at AO or EO level are likely to be brigaded campaigns.

the EO campaign for home office was 900 jobs and I think it said something like multiple roles on all of the supporting info. Still nothing, it’s so frustrating!

900!! ..... no wonder they are taking time with the job offers. If there are 900 to offer I wonder how many people were actually interviewed.

The application said first offers were going out today. I don’t understand how they score it (it was a video) and not give an option when it’s done in tranches

Administration of those bill campaigns is an industry within itself! Last time I applied to one it took a few weeks to be offered a role, basically behind the scenes they were working out how many to offer by touting out the successful candidates round the department to see who wanted to make offers to whom.

4/5 are good scores, I think I've given out a 6 once and never a 7. It's usually the DWP bulk campaigns where I hear about everyone getting 6/7, it's not at all usual across the civil service!