CV gap - agency asking for bank statements

[rogerthedodger]

When you say bank statements, do you mean your personal bank account(s) or your company bank account?

When you say gaps, do you mean a gap between contracts or gap between own company business and previous perm employment?

Apart from 'sensitive' sectors like financial services, it all sounds absolutely preposterous. In 25yrs as an independent I've never been asked for either, and nor would I consent to either. For goodness sake you're an owner / director of a business supplying a professional business service and unless you're god then you have to spend quite a lot of your working days doing sales, marketing, admin and CPD and therefore gaps. Haven't they got the brains to understand this?

Whatever next!?

[NCOTBAC]

When you say bank statements, do you mean your personal bank account(s) or your company bank account?

It's your personal one as they are doing checks on you.

When you say gaps, do you mean a gap between contracts or gap between own company business and previous perm employment?

It's gaps between contracts that show on your CV

Apart from 'sensitive' sectors like financial services, it all sounds absolutely preposterous.

Not really. You can still be working on financial systems in any client and then there is the whole sensitivity around clients IP and data.

In 25yrs as an independent I've never been asked for either, and nor would I consent to either. For goodness sake you're an owner / director of a business supplying a professional business service and unless you're god then you have to spend quite a lot of your working days doing sales, marketing, admin and CPD and therefore gaps. Haven't they got the brains to understand this?

Whatever next!?

Well you've been lucky as it's becoming more and more prevalent. My client is Retail and they've just started the same checks. Would you really bin a good gig just because of this? I wouldn't and I bet when it comes to it you wouldn't either.

They are covering their backsides as contractors are a risk so they are just carrying out diligence so the client will see it as worthwhile so it's not really about them having brains to see we aren't happy about it. Their risk so their choice.

BTW I don't agree with it either to be fair so I'm not defending it but I can see why they might want to do it. Just another hoop as life becomes more regulated.

[rogerthedodger]

It's your personal one as they are doing checks on you.

It's gaps between contracts that show on your CV

Not really. You can still be working on financial systems in any client and then there is the whole sensitivity around clients IP and data.



Well you've been lucky as it's becoming more and more prevalent. My client is Retail and they've just started the same checks. Would you really bin a good gig just because of this? I wouldn't and I bet when it comes to it you wouldn't either.

They are covering their backsides as contractors are a risk so they are just carrying out diligence so the client will see it as worthwhile so it's not really about them having brains to see we aren't happy about it. Their risk so their choice.

BTW I don't agree with it either to be fair so I'm not defending it but I can see why they might want to do it. Just another hoop as life becomes more regulated.

An interesting group of comments.

I'm not at all sure that asking for copies of bank statements is legal, but don't know for sure. Also supplying copies might invalidate you being reimbursed by a bank in the event of funds being extracted from your account by criminals. Best for folks to check with their banks if they haven't already done so, before handing over copies of bank statements.

A similar nasty habit recently adopted by one or two agencies is asking for copies of passports prior to a firm offer being given in writing. This was discussed on Linkedin and has definitely been declared to be illegal.

Regards gaps between contracts, all I would say here is that I never normally put dates on projects. I have generally taken the view that as an independent professional I have just ONE job, stated on CV as "Owner and Director of Xyz ltd: 1993 to date", and therefore no gaps. There are numerous projects, with numerous clients, but it's only one job. The total number of projects is stated and examples of recent projects are displayed, with achievements etc, and it's made clear they are only examples, but no dates are shown. A fistful of other projects are displayed as one-liners, but again dates not shown. If a CV looks like a long series of temporary jobs, rather than a genuine business supplying professional services, it can send out the wrong message. When you're in perm employment, for each job, you show job title and employer and job dates, but you wouldn't put dates on individual projects within that job, so why do it as a contractor?

If people really must include contract dates, it's a lot simpler and neater to show years only, not months, and so long as every calendar year is covered, all should be OK.

As you say, perhaps I've been lucky.

[WTFH]

I'm not at all sure that asking for copies of bank statements is legal...

A similar nasty habit recently adopted by one or two agencies is asking for copies of passports ...has definitely been declared to be illegal.

Please let us know which law says it is illegal to ask for a copy of a bank statement
And also which law says it is illegal to ask for a copy of a passport.

[LondonManc]

An interesting group of comments.

I'm not at all sure that asking for copies of bank statements is legal, but don't know for sure. Also supplying copies might invalidate you being reimbursed by a bank in the event of funds being extracted from your account by criminals. Best for folks to check with their banks if they haven't already done so, before handing over copies of bank statements.

A similar nasty habit recently adopted by one or two agencies is asking for copies of passports prior to a firm offer being given in writing. This was discussed on Linkedin and has definitely been declared to be illegal.

Regards gaps between contracts, all I would say here is that I never normally put dates on projects. I have generally taken the view that as an independent professional I have just ONE job, stated on CV as "Owner and Director of Xyz ltd: 1993 to date", and therefore no gaps. There are numerous projects, with numerous clients, but it's only one job. The total number of projects is stated and examples of recent projects are displayed, with achievements etc, and it's made clear they are only examples, but no dates are shown. A fistful of other projects are displayed as one-liners, but again dates not shown. If a CV looks like a long series of temporary jobs, rather than a genuine business supplying professional services, it can send out the wrong message. When you're in perm employment, for each job, you show job title and employer and job dates, but you wouldn't put dates on individual projects within that job, so why do it as a contractor?

If people really must include contract dates, it's a lot simpler and neater to show years only, not months, and so long as every calendar year is covered, all should be OK.

As you say, perhaps I've been lucky.

They're most interested in the last five years, for which banks generally want exact start and end dates when you get to screening. As such, your tactic/strategy of year only would fail. It could well be more relaxed in other industries but I can imagine that risk appetites are changing with the likes of the Talk Talk farce and other data breaches.

[Untouchable1]

Cracking stuff...

[rogerthedodger]

Please let us know which law says it is illegal to ask for a copy of a bank statement
And also which law says it is illegal to ask for a copy of a passport.

I didn't say it was illegal to ask for a copy of a bank statement, I'm simply saying that you might compromise your bank's protection conditions against criminal hacking into your account. If your bank finds out you haven't met the terms and conditions then they'll likely try and wriggle out of coughing up if your account is hacked and funds stolen.

Regards copies of passports, I've no idea which law (laws) applies (apply) and haven't got the time or inclination to find out all over again. It's all been discussed on LinkedIn and been checked with lawyer and is declared to be illegal. It may be that it contravenes the Age Discrimination Law, bearing in mind that a passport displayes DoB. Quite apart from the legal aspects, it would be most unwise to be sending your passport down the internet as an email attachment. Recruitment firms / agencies are prime targets for criminals trying to hack into records and harvest copies of passports and other information.

[rogerthedodger]

They're most interested in the last five years, for which banks generally want exact start and end dates when you get to screening. As such, your tactic/strategy of year only would fail. It could well be more relaxed in other industries but I can imagine that risk appetites are changing with the likes of the Talk Talk farce and other data breaches.

Sure, you can give exact start and end dates if you get that far in the process, but not at the CV stage.

[WTFH]

I didn't say it was illegal to ask for a copy of a bank statement,

You said:

I'm not at all sure that asking for copies of bank statements is legal...

Regards copies of passports, I've no idea which law (laws) applies (apply) and haven't got the time or inclination to find out all over again.

You said:

A similar nasty habit recently adopted by one or two agencies is asking for copies of passports ...has definitely been declared to be illegal.

So you're happy to spread a story, but unhappy to make an effort to back up the story.

[LondonManc]

Sure, you can give exact start and end dates if you get that far in the process, but not at the CV stage.

If I'm recruiting and you're being cagey about when you worked there (to hide gaps in cv or short contracts), you're not off to a good start with me. Year/month is a must imo.