Configuring roles and permissions

How Admins and HR users switch role-based permissions on and off, and how to limit HR users to specific locations.

Roles decide the baseline of what people can do in Recruit. The Roles & Permissions page in Settings lets you adjust that baseline for your organisation: who can move candidates, who can see CVs, whether agencies see pipeline stages, and more. The same page is where you limit HR users to particular locations. For what each role can do by default, see "Understanding roles and permissions".

Who can open the page

Admins and HR users can open Settings > Team & Access > Roles & Permissions. Members, agency users, hiring managers and interviewers do not see the card, and if they reach the address directly they get the message "You don't have permission to view this page."

Opening the page and changing a setting are not the same thing. HR users can change the two pipeline settings. Everything else on the page, including HR location access, can be changed by Admins only. A setting that an HR user cannot change may still appear on the page, but saving it fails with an error. Some settings are hidden from HR altogether: the candidate access and notification settings, and the HR location table.

If your organisation manages subsidiary companies, a company selector appears at the top right of the page. Each setting applies to the company you have selected.

How settings save

Every setting is a switch. It saves the moment you click it, and a message confirms the change, for example "Pipeline permissions updated". If the save fails you see an error such as "Could not update pipeline permissions" and the switch stays where it was. There is no Save button. The switch is greyed out while a save is in progress.

The settings are grouped under five headings, in this order.

Pipeline permissions

Candidate stage moves, with the switch Allow hiring managers and interviewers to move candidates. Off by default. When it is off, only Admins, HR users and a job's recruiter can move candidates between pipeline stages. When it is on, hiring managers and interviewers on the job can move them too. Any visibility rules set on an individual stage still apply.
Sub-status permissions, with the switch Allow hiring managers to edit a candidate's sub-status. Off by default. When it is off, only Admins, HR users and the job's recruiter can change a candidate's sub-status. Interviewers and Members can never change it, whatever this switch says.

Candidate access permissions

These two are visible and editable by Admins only.

Candidate CV visibility, with the switch Hide candidate CVs from Members. Off by default. When it is on, Member users cannot view, preview or download candidate CVs anywhere in Recruit. Admins and HR users are not affected.
Hiring Manager CV upload, with the switch Allow Hiring Managers to add a CV. Off by default. When it is on, a hiring manager can add the first CV for a candidate on a job they are assigned to. Replacing a CV that already exists still needs an Admin or HR user.

Agency permissions

Agency Pipeline Status Visibility has one switch: Let agency users see their candidates' pipeline status. Off by default, in which case agency users cannot see which pipeline stage the candidates they submitted are in. Turn it on and they can.

Approval permissions

Admin Bypass, with the switch Enable admin bypass. Off by default. When it is on, Admins can bypass the approval workflow and approve jobs automatically.
Edit Job After Approval, with the switch Allow editing of job details after approval. Off by default. When it is on, Job Details and the approval justification can be edited after a job has been approved.

Approval groups and workflows are not configured here.

Notification permissions

Admins only. Allow people to edit their own notifications is on by default. Turn it off and everyone follows the organisation defaults instead of their own choices. Nothing people previously chose is deleted: their choices come back if you turn the switch on again.

While it is off, people opening their notification settings see "Your organisation manages notification preferences centrally, so these settings are read-only." Admins are locked to the defaults in the same way for their own notifications, but they can still change the defaults themselves. To set those defaults per role, go to Settings > Notifications and select Configure defaults. See "Notification preferences" for what people see.

HR location access

By default an HR user sees everything in the organisation. HR location access lets an Admin limit an HR user to the jobs at certain locations. It is at the bottom of the Roles & Permissions page and is visible to Admins only. The HR Location Access card in Settings still exists and takes you to a message that the setting has moved, with a Go to Roles & Permissions link.

The table lists active users with the HR role, with the columns Name, Email, Access and Edit. Use Search HR users to filter by name or email. Users with any other role are not listed; a line above the table tells you how many other active users are hidden and links to user management. If nobody has the HR role yet, assign it under Settings > Users first.

Limiting an HR user

Select the pencil icon in the Edit column for the user. The Configure access panel opens.
Choose one of the three options: All locations, Specific locations or None.
If you chose Specific locations, tick the locations the user should have. Only active locations are offered. If you have none, you see "No locations yet. Add your first office location." Locations are managed under Settings > Locations.
Select Save. A message reads "Access updated" and the Access column shows the result: All locations, a count such as 2 locations, or None.

Each change is recorded in the audit log.

What the user sees afterwards

All locations: no restriction. This is where every HR user starts.
Specific locations: the user sees jobs at the ticked locations, plus any job with no location set. They see candidates who have an application on one of those jobs, and candidates who have no applications at all. Reports cover only the jobs they can see. A job outside their locations is reported as not found if they try to open it.
None: the user sees no jobs and no candidates.

Choosing Specific locations and ticking nothing is allowed. That user sees only jobs with no location set, so tick at least one location unless that is what you want.

Only HR users can be limited this way, and saving is refused for anyone who does not currently have the HR role. Admins are never restricted.

When changes take effect

The server checks these settings each time someone acts, so a change applies to their next action without them signing in again. Screens that are already open can be slower to catch up. The agency and notification settings are loaded along with a person's session, so someone already signed in may need to refresh the page to see the interface change, for example to see a hidden or read-only notifications page. HR location changes apply the next time the HR user loads a job or candidate list.

If someone reports that they can or cannot do something you expected, first check the switch on this page, then check their role in Settings > Users, and ask them to refresh.