References - advice needed please.

[ForgottenwhoIam]

Hi, please can somebody help with this scenario?

I’ve been out of work a year due to taking a career break, and now I have started applying for other jobs.

On one application form, I needed to give reference details from my last employment, so I put down my last manager.

Since then, I’ve spoke to someone who still works there, and found my last manager has retired.

She gave me the number of the current manager so I contacted her, and she says she cannot provide a reference as I had already left when she started. She gave me details of the manager I had before my last manager (🙄 sorry for rambling), but she has moved on to another Trust.

So…..who provides me with a reference ?

I was there since 2005, NHS, so I appreciate people and systems change a lot, and it seems especially in the last 12 months since I’ve gone, but nobody seems to be able to help.

Any advice is appreciated, thank you in advance

Good question- following.

It's the employer not the manager who is responsible for the reference. Whether the manager works there or not is irrelevant. However, they are not usually obliged to give a reference, but if it's in your contract then they have to. Can you ask central HR to just give a reference that confirms the date you started/left and that you had no disciplinaries?

https://www.acas.org.uk/providing-a-job-reference/if-you-cannot-get-a-reference

Do you not just send it to HR? Everywhere I have worked we had to forward any reference requests to HR even if we received them directly.

Your previous employer can confirm your dates of employment and duties. Put down either the current manage or the HR manager. Under the circumstances that's the closest to a reference you will get, and these days it's abouts as meaningful/detailed as many references get.

Sorry, that should be:

Who provides a future employer with a reference when they contact a candidates former workplace and the staff cannot help due to ever changing management ?

It's the employer not the manager who is responsible for the reference. Whether the manager works there or not is irrelevant. However, they are not usually obliged to give a reference, but if it's in your contract then they have to. Can you ask central HR to just give a reference that confirms the date you started/left and that you had no disciplinaries?

Thank you @KaiserChefs , that is very helpful.

It's HR that should provide the reference. It doesn't matter if nobody works there now who knew you. It's just a factual reference. X workef here between start date/end date in Y role.

Thank you to all that have replied also.
It’s been a long time since I’ve needed to provide a reference, I wasn’t aware of HR involvement 💐