No salary on job adverts!

[Countdown]

kev1974 said:

Oh well, have emailed a polite couple of paragraphs to their recruitment inbox saying I like their organisation and know that I have the skills they require, but would it be possible to learn the salary range as it will guide me as to whether I should apply or not. Will see what, if anything, I get back.

So irritating!

They will write back saying that salary is commensurate with experience and ask you what your current salary is. Surprisingly the package they offer will be 0.0001% more than the salary you're on

Yes very irritating and (IME) it puts off people with the experience that we need. It however does attract shedloads of speculative CVs from people who don't have the relative experience but are exceptional at bullstting.

[AbzGuyGTI]

Countdown said:

kev1974 said:

Oh well, have emailed a polite couple of paragraphs to their recruitment inbox saying I like their organisation and know that I have the skills they require, but would it be possible to learn the salary range as it will guide me as to whether I should apply or not. Will see what, if anything, I get back.

So irritating!

They will write back saying that salary is commensurate with experience and ask you what your current salary is. Surprisingly the package they offer will be 0.0001% more than the salary you're on

Yes very irritating and (IME) it puts off people with the experience that we need. It however does attract shedloads of speculative CVs from people who don't have the relative experience but are exceptional at bullstting.

Yup had this last month, we would like you to come for an interview...no problem but what is the salary range of the position as the description is spot on and your a great company.....sorry we cannot disclose that information but if you tell us what your range is we will let you know....i go back with my expected salary range (not high for the position but maybe top end or so).....they respond, sorry that is outwith our range so we will remove you from the interview process...! Useless!!

[louiebaby]

The issue of no salary on adverts doesn't bother me too much, it only takes a few seconds to apply with a CV, and if they invite you to interview, you ask before agreeing to meet them. If they won't tell you, then don't go.

It is a pet hate of mine though. If I won the lottery, I'd spend a week applying to every job without a salary listed, with a particularly amazing CV, and make the point when I'm called.

[bad company]

Lemming Train said:

Any job ad that doesn't put the salary will be paying peanuts. That's the whole reason why they don't put it because if they did no-one would apply. Same applies to job ads that list the salary as "competitive".

That’s not right. There’s several reasons firms may not advertise salaries. One being that they don’t want existing employees to see the range.

[Prof Prolapse]

bad company said:

One being that they don’t want existing employees to see the range.

Which could only be for reasons of poor management and/or lack of ethics...

There’s literally no reason not to be transparent about salary ranges.

[SteBrown91]

Prof Prolapse said:

Which could only be for reasons of poor management and/or lack of ethics...

There’s literally no reason not to be transparent about salary ranges.

This. The only reason a company wouldn’t want their existing employees seeing salary is because the company have mugged the existing off by underpaying, and don’t want to cause a revolt.

If everyone was on the same salary band in a properly structured transparent pay grade system then they would publish it.

[Lemming Train]

bad company said:

Lemming Train said:

Any job ad that doesn't put the salary will be paying peanuts. That's the whole reason why they don't put it because if they did no-one would apply. Same applies to job ads that list the salary as "competitive".

That’s not right. There’s several reasons firms may not advertise salaries. One being that they don’t want existing employees to see the range.

Why would they not want existing employees to see the range?

Oh and list the other "several reasons" please while you're at it.

[kev1974]

louiebaby said:

The issue of no salary on adverts doesn't bother me too much, it only takes a few seconds to apply with a CV, and if they invite you to interview, you ask before agreeing to meet them. If they won't tell you, then don't go.

It is a pet hate of mine though. If I won the lottery, I'd spend a week applying to every job without a salary listed, with a particularly amazing CV, and make the point when I'm called.

It doesn't only take a few seconds though, I'm in IT so I always have to adjust the skills and recent projects sections of the CV to emphasise or diminish certain skills to suit the role. Also they generally want a covering letter which always takes a little while to craft properly. The jobs I am applying to are not ones where one cover letter suits all opportunities.

Increasingly I'm also finding several employers now using "application portals" which force you to apply using their fixed question form, they take bloody ages to fill in, as their questions never quite align with my CV headings and sections, I hate those.

Ah well the employer whose salary-less job ad I saw yesterday has had all morning to reply to me with salary details and they haven't replied at all, so I guess I'll cross them off my list, as they say "their loss!".

[bad company]

Lemming Train said:

bad company said:

Lemming Train said:

Any job ad that doesn't put the salary will be paying peanuts. That's the whole reason why they don't put it because if they did no-one would apply. Same applies to job ads that list the salary as "competitive".

That’s not right. There’s several reasons firms may not advertise salaries. One being that they don’t want existing employees to see the range.

Why would they not want existing employees to see the range?

Oh and list the other "several reasons" please while you're at it.

Because they may have to pay the new person more than existing staff. I’m not saying it’s right, just that it happens.

Several reasons include not wanting competitors to know what they’re paying and wanting to see who’s out there and at what cost.

[kev1974]

bad company said:

Because they may have to pay the new person more than existing staff. I’m not saying it’s right, just that it happens.

Several reasons include not wanting competitors to know what they’re paying and wanting to see who’s out there and at what cost.

But that latter is self-defeating if a load of the better people don't bother applying, because they don't think the salary will be there to make it worth their while applying.

[bad company]

kev1974 said:

bad company said:

Because they may have to pay the new person more than existing staff. I’m not saying it’s right, just that it happens.

Several reasons include not wanting competitors to know what they’re paying and wanting to see who’s out there and at what cost.

But that latter is self-defeating if a load of the better people don't bother applying, because they don't think the salary will be there to make it worth their while applying.

You may well be right.

I owned and managed a recruitment agency, not having a salary range to work with made life difficult.

[Lemming Train]

bad company said:

Lemming Train said:

bad company said:

Lemming Train said:

Any job ad that doesn't put the salary will be paying peanuts. That's the whole reason why they don't put it because if they did no-one would apply. Same applies to job ads that list the salary as "competitive".

That’s not right. There’s several reasons firms may not advertise salaries. One being that they don’t want existing employees to see the range.

Why would they not want existing employees to see the range?

Oh and list the other "several reasons" please while you're at it.

Because they may have to pay the new person more than existing staff. I’m not saying it’s right, just that it happens.

So why argue that what I wrote is "not right" then? It doesn't matter how you word it, it boils down to the company not listing the salary because they're paying peanuts.

In reply to your other comment, why would they not want other companies to see what they're paying? That makes no sense whatsoever... unless they're paying peanuts! If they were paying a decent rate then advertising this would obviously greatly increase the number of applications and also show their competitors that they need to look at increasing their own rates if they don't want to start losing their staff.

In fact you (as an agency) are one of the worst offenders for it. In 99% of cases you know exactly what the client will pay but you deliberately write "competitive" in the hope you get a cheap clueless EE walk through the door who will just accept whatever rate you tell him thus pocketing you a tidy sum for doing feck all.

[HantsRat]

Unless it's a quick 1 click apply I won't even bother applying for jobs with no salary.

[blueg33]

I phone the recruiter and ask. If they ask my salary, I don't tell them, but I do tell them what I am looking for as a bare minimum

[brickwall]

Lemming Train said:

bad company said:

Lemming Train said:

bad company said:

Lemming Train said:

Any job ad that doesn't put the salary will be paying peanuts. That's the whole reason why they don't put it because if they did no-one would apply. Same applies to job ads that list the salary as "competitive".

That’s not right. There’s several reasons firms may not advertise salaries. One being that they don’t want existing employees to see the range.

Why would they not want existing employees to see the range?

Oh and list the other "several reasons" please while you're at it.

Because they may have to pay the new person more than existing staff. I’m not saying it’s right, just that it happens.

So why argue that what I wrote is "not right" then? It doesn't matter how you word it, it boils down to the company not listing the salary because they're paying peanuts.

In reply to your other comment, why would they not want other companies to see what they're paying? That makes no sense whatsoever... unless they're paying peanuts! If they were paying a decent rate then advertising this would obviously greatly increase the number of applications and also show their competitors that they need to look at increasing their own rates if they don't want to start losing their staff.

In fact you (as an agency) are one of the worst offenders for it. In 99% of cases you know exactly what the client will pay but you deliberately write "competitive" in the hope you get a cheap clueless EE walk through the door who will just accept whatever rate you tell him thus pocketing you a tidy sum for doing feck all.

This is a harsh view. Personally I'm all in favour of declaring salary, and I do so for every job I hire in my company.

But there are reasons why you don't necessarily want to declare, which aren't 'because it's peanuts'. Such reasons could include:
- It's very variable. Bonus, commission, profit share and share ownership plans could make up a majority of the package; and it's all dependent on how the company performs
- You don't want competitors seeing it - how you pay your staff is potentially a competitive advantage, so you don't want to publish it everywhere.
- It's very different from existing staff - perhaps because you are intentionally trying to recruit a different calibre of individual. You may or may not be underpaying existing staff; but you might not want to say "I think you're all a bit weak and I want someone better"
- It's an obscene number, and you don't want clients or the public seeing it

[SAS Tom]

The job I’ve got now didn’t declare the salary on the advert. I also had to fill in their own application rather than just send in my cv. I wasn’t even going to bother doing it all but glad I did now. The job turned out to pay top end for what I do and they weren’t shy in telling me what it was fairly early on.

[Lemming Train]

brickwall said:

Lemming Train said:

bad company said:

Lemming Train said:

bad company said:

Lemming Train said:

Any job ad that doesn't put the salary will be paying peanuts. That's the whole reason why they don't put it because if they did no-one would apply. Same applies to job ads that list the salary as "competitive".

That’s not right. There’s several reasons firms may not advertise salaries. One being that they don’t want existing employees to see the range.

Why would they not want existing employees to see the range?

Oh and list the other "several reasons" please while you're at it.

Because they may have to pay the new person more than existing staff. I’m not saying it’s right, just that it happens.

So why argue that what I wrote is "not right" then? It doesn't matter how you word it, it boils down to the company not listing the salary because they're paying peanuts.

In reply to your other comment, why would they not want other companies to see what they're paying? That makes no sense whatsoever... unless they're paying peanuts! If they were paying a decent rate then advertising this would obviously greatly increase the number of applications and also show their competitors that they need to look at increasing their own rates if they don't want to start losing their staff.

In fact you (as an agency) are one of the worst offenders for it. In 99% of cases you know exactly what the client will pay but you deliberately write "competitive" in the hope you get a cheap clueless EE walk through the door who will just accept whatever rate you tell him thus pocketing you a tidy sum for doing feck all.

This is a harsh view. Personally I'm all in favour of declaring salary, and I do so for every job I hire in my company.

But there are reasons why you don't necessarily want to declare, which aren't 'because it's peanuts'. Such reasons could include:
- It's very variable. Bonus, commission, profit share and share ownership plans could make up a majority of the package; and it's all dependent on how the company performs
- You don't want competitors seeing it - how you pay your staff is potentially a competitive advantage, so you don't want to publish it everywhere.
- It's very different from existing staff - perhaps because you are intentionally trying to recruit a different calibre of individual. You may or may not be underpaying existing staff; but you might not want to say "I think you're all a bit weak and I want someone better"
- It's an obscene number, and you don't want clients or the public seeing it

1. is easily workable with x basic + commission (or variant thereof). No reason to hide it.
2. boils down to "we pay peanuts"
3. boils down to "we pay peanuts"
4. never happens.

[brickwall]

Lemming Train said:

1. is easily workable with x basic + commission (or variant thereof). No reason to hide it.
2. boils down to "we pay peanuts"
3. boils down to "we pay peanuts"
4. never happens.

1. Maybe not at a low level. But if it's equity linked, you might not have decided the roll-overs, refinancings, hurdle rates and clawbacks.
2 and 3 - not sure it does - for the same reasons as (1). Even if you have decided them, you could well not want to declare them.
4. One springs to mind straight away
Charities. A big charity might want to be coy about the £400k salary they're offering; it's not super money and is probably market rate for a good senior leader, but there are lots who'd complain about it.
The right answer is of course transparency and to convince people why that salary is needed, but they might not want to have that fight right now.

I fear you don't want to hear anything counter to your view, no matter how well reasoned, so I think we'll have to agree to disagree.

[James_B]

Lemming Train said:

Any job ad that doesn't put the salary will be paying peanuts. That's the whole reason why they don't put it because if they did no-one would apply. Same applies to job ads that list the salary as "competitive".

That’s not really right.

It is pretty much never put on jobs in investment banking, and that pays very well.

[Register1]

Lemming Train said:

Any job ad that doesn't put the salary will be paying peanuts. That's the whole reason why they don't put it because if they did no-one would apply. Same applies to job ads that list the salary as "competitive".

Exactly.

If there is no salary indication, then I can't be bothered spending time on polishing the CV,
Move on,