

Ask HN: A friend has a plan to get a job in UK, worried about legal implications - gallinaponedora

Hi, I'm asking on behalf of a good friend and fellow programmer who is looking for a job in London, UK after being made redundant recently.<p>She told me that virtually every offer in job boards are posted by recruiters, who liaise with the companies to help them get candidates.<p>She used recruiters in the past to get her previous job and told me of the ordeal that was to deal with most of them, who conducted themselves with a remarkable lack of morals, taking advantage of her naivety. She was threatened, harassed, verbally abused, lied, etc. She went once to an office were the first thing they did was to ask for her passport to make a photocopy without asking her first and much much more.<p>So she wants to avoid them now, the problem is that they are few offers of employment that aren't advertised through them and most of them are in boards like this that are used by start ups while she prefers working in medium or "big co" where her experience can command a higher salary.<p>To the point: her plan is to create a fake cv with a different name, talk to the recruiters, get the companies name out of them and apply to those companies on her own. I'm concerned about her because she doesn't know for sure whether she would be breaking the law or not doing this, and she could end in a bad position being in legal trouble, possible blacklisted and unemployed.<p>Can someone offer some insight here. What would you do in her situation? She would really loathe to deal with those people again.<p>Thanks.<p>Otherwise if you want to write to her directly send me a pm for her email address.<p>PD: I'm mainly a lurker but decided to ask for help here today for the first time, as it was the first place I could think of for this purpose. I know there are many people from UK here too.
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notahacker
She sounds a bit paranoid to me: checking passports is in theory part of a UK
employment agency's legal obligations. If that's the sort of thing she's
inclined to make a fuss about, it's not surprising if they were less than
polite and helpful afterwards. Sure, recruiters also exaggerate how good some
positions are, claim advertised jobs are filled and offer alternatives you're
not interested in or suitable for, but employers do that too. Recruiters don't
have a great reputation, but that's more down to them being expensive for
employers and annoyingly persistent than dangerously immoral.

There probably aren't any legal issues with sticking up a fake CV if you get
hired on the basis of a real one, but rest assured it's not going to look good
with employers if she applies for positions they haven't got round to
advertising yet or if they end up with a copy of two suspiciously similar CVs
with similar names, or if it turns out the third party recruiter is actually
being retained to do the initial screening interview (it happens!)

If she's worried about having her passport photocopied she doesn't sound savvy
enough to be doing what the recruiter will consider to be cheating them out of
commission, and even an employer that's quietly pleased not to be paying
commissions will worry about dishonesty if she gets found out.

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CWIZO
I'm a Slovenian currently looking for a job in London. As far as I can tell
there are many "direct" job postings. You just have to look a bit:

<http://www.cwjobs.co.uk/> <http://roundabout.io/>
<http://workinstartups.com/> <http://www.gumtree.com/>
[https://jobs.github.com/positions?description=&location=...](https://jobs.github.com/positions?description=&location=london)
<http://www.3-beards.com/jobs> <http://careers.stackoverflow.com/> ...

I've also had good experience with recruiters so far. Haven't gotten a offer
yet, but I did get a face-to-face interview for next friday :)

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pcowans
It's certainly not difficult to apply directly to the big tech players - you
can find these pretty easily with '<company name> uk careers' Google searches:

<http://www.google.co.uk/about/jobs/locations/london/>
<https://www.facebook.com/careers/locations/london>
[https://jobs.apple.com/uk/search?jobFunction=SFWEG#&t=0&...](https://jobs.apple.com/uk/search?jobFunction=SFWEG#&t=0&sb=req_open_dt&so=1&j=SFWEG&lo=0*GBR&pN=0)
<http://careers.microsoft.com/careers/en/gb/home.aspx>
<http://www.ibm.com/employment/uk/>

I don't really have any experience applying to mid-range companies, but
intuitively it doesn't feel right that anyone should feel the need to conceal
their identity when searching for a developer role, especially if your friend
is experienced enough to be optimising salary rather than worrying about
getting a job at all. Are you sure there hasn't been a misunderstanding?

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jrogers65
Being a web developer in London who has dealt with many agencies, I call
bullshit on this. Not one recruiter who I have dealt with has been a problem
for me, quite the opposite, in fact. There is something wrong with your
friend's perception of reality; that is to say, she is delusional and
paranoid.

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gallinaponedora
Dunno, I believe her. As I said it might be the fact that she was foreigner,
just arrived and not assertive. (if I may add, I'm even surprised someone has
a positive or even neutral opinion of recruiters! I'm pretty pretty sure that
that view is not the common consensus, whether her case is extreme or not)

~~~
jrogers65
Seriously? They're a blessing - I'm rarely unemployed for more than a week
thanks to them.

~~~
pcowans
This may be the difference between being a contractor and being after a
permanent position. For the latter, with the exception of very senior roles,
you don't often hear people talk about them as anything better than a
necessary evil.

~~~
jrogers65
Ah, that explains it. I didn't use agencies when I was a junior and aim for
lead dev/senior positions these days.

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hazza1
Not sure in which field your friend works but I'd say things are no longer
like this, most medium to large firm resent paying for agents so put their
jobs up on their websites and encourage applicants.

Pretty much go to any major firms homepage and they'll have a list of open
positions that you can apply directly for.

Personally I've never had an issue with using recruiters and have used them in
conjunction with applying myself. I prefer the buffer of using them but you
can't beat your own research.

~~~
gallinaponedora
Thanks for the advice, she is a web dev. She might have had problem because
she is a foreigner, maybe just bad luck... no idea.

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MattBearman
I'm a UK based Web developer, and about three years ago I was looking for a
job in the London area. While some of the recruiters I spoke to were a little
bit pushy, they were nothing like the experience your friend previously had.
So I think the fake cv thing is probably unnecessary.

