Forum: workplace.stackexchange.com
Tags: <interviewing><ethics>
Title: Remote job interview cancelled 5 minute before interview time
Question: I had an video call interview that was scheduled for a specific time.  5 minutes before the interview I got an email from them saying that they were cancelling my interview because there were many other candidates also waiting for the same post.  This is not fair. I took holiday from my current job for this interview.   What should I do in this case?

Answers:
sents: text: Short answer is... not a lot.
text: There's nothing you can really do if a potentially employer cancels your interview, whether it be last minute or way in advanced.
text: This is not fair.
text: Correct.
text: Sometimes these things happen.
answer_details: author: workplace.stackexchange.com/users/83963/Twyxz
score: 182
sents: text: Welcome to StackExchange and life!
text: Unfortunately not much you can do, if they decided to cancel your interview at least they won't waste your time with further interviews and no offer.
text: Last year I used a big portion of my holiday on interviews as the company I was working for was possibly going under.
text: Instead of taking a day off, try and arrange for "working from home" with current employer, or longer lunch breaks, leaving early and working the hours.
text: This will help you if your current employer is flexible enough, that will definitely save you some of your holiday.
text: Other than that, just enjoy your day off, take your time applying for better positions with the time you have off.
text: Edit on the "working from home":
text: Most places I've worked at if you required to work from home because of personal reasons or
text: otherwise, you would be given a task or goal to try to achieve.
text: You would be required to participate in meetings through skype and so on (when possible).
text: This allowed the use of some time during the day for the interview that you could make up the same day by working extra hours at the end and still achieve the deliverable you had set up as a goal.
answer_details: author: workplace.stackexchange.com/users/98181/fireshark519
score: 52
sents: text: You should definitely post your experience to glassdoor.com.
text: This will allow others to understand the unprofessional nature of the company before they get to involved.
text: Your review may not carry much weight but if they have a history of unprofessional behavior then their record will show that in time.
answer_details: author: workplace.stackexchange.com/users/27302/NDEthos
score: 42
sents: text: What should I do in this case?
text: Learn.
text: Any interview process involves a large amount of trust from both sides on all sorts of aspects, one of the most important of which is that the other party is serious and committed to seeing the process through.
text: The truth is that in the vast majority of recruitment processes, both sides are evaluating many options simultaneously.
text: When one option results in an acceptable offer, they cancel all the other processes in the interests of saving everyone's time.
text: When you go into interview processes, you have to know this and plan around it.
text: It does happen.
text: The odds of it happening depend on the company's recruiting strategy, and here you've come across a particularly extreme case where they did cast a wide net, weren't particularly committed to seeing the process through with you, and didn't mind wasting your time.
text: The 5 min cancellation is particularly annoying and unfair, yes, though at least they were honest about it!
text: So, what's the lesson?
text: You will always fundamentally need to trust the company when interviewing, but in future you should take steps to build and validate this trust before you make commitments like taking holidays to accommodate the interview process.
text: A few things you can do Ask plainly in initial communication what the process will be, what specifically will happen and when.
text: Don't begin the process until this has been explained.
text: If it's not already part of the official process, ask for a quick introductory call with the Hiring Manager before beginning it.
text: 15 minutes is enough.
text: Introduce yourselves and talk about the role.
text: You can usually get a decent signal on if the other party is serious based on this.
text: Be more casual and flexible about early stages in the process.
text: Especially if it's a call, ask if it can be done before or after your usual working hours
text: so you don't have to take holiday.
text: Confirm 24 hours in advance, and then a couple of hours in advance, of the interview, that it's still going ahead.
text: These two time periods give them two easy 'get out' opportunities and if they do need to cancel really late on, at least you can somewhat salvage your schedule with a bit more notice.
text: All of the above will be looked on positively by anyone serious.
text: If you get cold or negative reactions to any of them, it's a red flag and you should be the one withdrawing from the process at that point.
answer_details: author: workplace.stackexchange.com/users/88748/davnicwil
score: 13
sents: text: You could call your manager and ask if he's happy that you cancel your holiday; or make it a half day depending on the time left.
text: This way you can recover some or all of your holiday, and I don't know any managers that will care about this odd day going wrong.
text: While it might seem harsh, at least they called to cancel rather than just not tell you.
answer_details: author: workplace.stackexchange.com/users/69379/UKMonkey
score: 5
sents: text: Unless they asked you to take a holiday (in which case you might be able to get some compensation - ask a lawyer in your locale, potentially one in the prospective employers' country too), I don't see what you could do except tell them just that and maybe ask for a reimbursement.
text: Unfortunately you missed your ideal time window right when you had the interview lined up (they might have reconsidered and went on with the interview).
text: I assume they decided against you anyways after seeing other candidates applications.
text: But this and other possibilities are pure speculation, so Move on ...and enjoy your "holiday" This is not fair.
text: Sadly life is not fair, welcome to the world.
answer_details: author: workplace.stackexchange.com/users/87734/DigitalBlade969
score: 1

Summary of the answers:
There's not a lot you can do about this. Think of it as a learning experience and post it on glassdoor.com. See if you can at least work half a day and cancel your holiday with your employer.
The general consensus is that there is little you can do about this situation. At the very least, you might want to try and recover the remainder of the work day so that you don't lose your holiday allowance. Otherwise, consider what you can learn from the experience and, if you feel it might be beneficial to others, post your experience on glassdoor.com.