Employer reference advice

[Bellenden Belle]

So I am in the process of moving jobs.

I have just discovered, bizarrely, that it is company policy to provide no written response in request for references but instead to offer an informal chat on the telephone.

This has been done with my departing colleagues, and has just happened with a freelance employer who alerted me to the rather odd procedure.

Is this legal? Apparently it is being done on the advice of our chair, an intellectual property lawer.

Edited to add that googling suggests it is legal. Oh well.

[Laddy Muck]

Hi BB.

Basically, not only may an ex-employer do as you describe above, but - contrary to popular belief - s/he is under no legal obligation to actually supply a reference AT ALL - UNLESS this was agreed beforehand (so check your employment contract). There are exceptions to this general premise but, from what I know of your job, I don't think these apply to you.

Note, it's a few years since I worked in employment law, but I have no reason to believe the situation has changed.

[reeko]

I think it has become standard practise now that references on paper only tend to confirm facts such as so and so worked here from this date to that date, they had X sick days and didn't brun the building down. This is because anyone has the right to request to see their references, making them not worth the paper they are written on.

[ElmGrove]

Maybe you could work with your employer to write a reference that you both are happy with and agree can be forwarded on to any future employers. That is what I did when I left a job. That way it can be sent out without the need for any phone calls, unless of course your current employer likes chatting on the phone.

[Lowlander]

In my early twenties, I got a call from the US one afternoon at work, and had a fairly informal chat with the caller about a bloke who used to work in a different department. I painted a fairly rosy picture as he had been a good mate at the time.

It was halfway through the call that I realised this was effectively a reference and that it was totally against company policy for me to help (all requests go to HR who provide a standard written one). The caller was a company somewhere in Nevada.

My Managing Director was sitting right next to me and didn't suspect a thing.

Anyway what Laddy Much says, quite legal.