Employers: preventing discrimination

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Discrimination in recruitment

Discrimination in job adverts

You must not state or imply in a job advert that you’ll discriminate against anyone. This includes saying that you are not able to cater for workers with a disability.

Only use phrases like ‘recent graduate’ or ‘highly experienced’ when these are actual requirements of the job. Otherwise you could discriminate against younger or older people who might not have had the opportunity to get qualifications.

Where you advertise might cause indirect discrimination - for example, advertising only in men’s magazines.

Get help advertising a job without discriminating

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Questions you cannot ask when recruiting

You must not ask candidates about ‘protected characteristics’ or whether they:

  • are married, single or in a civil partnership
  • have children or plan to have children

Asking about health or disability

You can only ask about health or disability if:

  • there are necessary requirements of the job that cannot be met with reasonable adjustments
  • you’re finding out if someone needs help to take part in a selection test or interview
  • you’re using ‘positive action’ to recruit a disabled person

You might be breaking the law if any discrimination happens during their recruitment process, even if you use a recruitment agency.

Asking for a date of birth

You can only ask for someone’s date of birth on an application form if they must be a certain age to do the job, for example selling alcohol.

You can ask someone their date of birth on a separate equality monitoring form. You should not let the person selecting or interviewing candidates see this form.

Spent criminal convictions

Applicants do not have to tell you about criminal convictions that are spent. You must treat the applicant as if the conviction has not happened, and cannot refuse to employ the person because of their conviction.

There are some areas of employment that are exempt from this rule, for example schools.

Trade union membership

You must not use membership of a trade union as a factor in deciding whether to employ someone. This includes:

  • not employing someone because they’re a member of a trade union
  • insisting someone joins a trade union before you’ll employ them

Employing people with protected characteristics

You can choose a candidate who has a protected characteristic over one who does not if they’re both suitable for the job and you think that people with that characteristic:

  • are underrepresented in the workforce, profession or industry
  • suffer a disadvantage connected to that characteristic (for example people from a certain ethnic group are not often given jobs in your sector)

You can only do this if you’re trying to address the under-representation or disadvantage for that particular characteristic. You must make decisions on a case by case basis and not because of a certain policy.

You cannot choose a candidate who is not as suitable for the job just because they have a protected characteristic.

Favouring disabled candidates

When a disabled person and a non-disabled person both meet the job requirements, you can treat the disabled person more favourably.

View a printable version of the whole guide

Part of Employ someone: step by step

  1. Step 1 Check your business is ready to employ staff

    1. Prepare your business to take on employees

  2. Step 2 Recruit someone

    You need to advertise the role and interview candidates. You can use a recruitment agency to do this or do it yourself.

    1. Find out about recruiting someone yourself on Acas
    2. Find out about using a recruitment agency

    As an employer you must make sure you recruit employees fairly.

    1. You are currently viewing: Avoid discrimination during recruitment
    2. Make your application process accessible for employees with disabilities or health conditions

  3. and Check they have the right to work in the UK

    1. Find out how to check an applicant's right to work

  4. and Find out if they need a DBS check

    You may need to check someone's criminal record, for example, if they'll be working in healthcare or with children.

    1. Find out if you need a DBS check
    2. How to do a DBS check

  5. Step 3 Check if they need to be put into a workplace pension

    Check if you need to put your employee into a workplace pension scheme:

  6. Step 4 Agree a contract and salary

    When someone accepts a job offer they have a contract with you as their employer.

    1. Check what the National Minimum Wage is for different ages
    2. Check what the National Minimum Wage is for different types of work
    3. Check what to include in a contract
    4. Agree a written statement of employment particulars

  7. Step 5 Tell HMRC about your new employee

    You must tell HMRC about your new employee on or before their first pay day.

    1. Tell HMRC about a new employee
    2. Get their personal details and P45 to work out their tax code
    3. If you don’t have their P45, use HMRC’s ‘starter checklist’
    4. Check what to do when you start paying your employee

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