Data exports

Set up exports of candidate, application, job, offer and onboarding data, delivered by SFTP or email, or downloaded on demand.

Data Exports lets a System Admin build a named export that pulls chosen fields into a CSV or Excel file. The file can be sent to an SFTP server, emailed to one or more addresses, or downloaded straight from the screen. Typical uses are payroll feeds, HR system feeds and one-off reporting extracts.

Who can use it

Only System Admins. HR, Member and Agency users cannot open the page, and the same restriction applies to creating, editing, running, downloading and deleting exports. Anyone else who reaches the page is told that only admins can manage data exports.

If your organisation is a group parent, a company selector appears at the top right of the page. Exports belong to one company, so pick the company first. The list, the field choices and any changes then apply to that company.

Where to find it

Go to Settings, then the Compliance section, then Data Exports. Each export in the list shows its name, delivery type (SFTP or Email), format (CSV or Excel (.xlsx)), schedule (Not scheduled, Daily or Weekly), and when it last ran, or Never run. The newest export is at the top. A red Last run failed label appears after a failed run; hover over it to read the error.

Create an export

Select Create Export (shown when the list is empty) or Add Export below the list.
Enter a Name, up to 255 characters. Save stays greyed out until you do. The name is also used in the file name.
Choose the Delivery type: SFTP (the default) or Email.
Choose the Format: CSV (the default) or Excel (.xlsx).
Choose the Schedule: Not scheduled (the default), Daily or Weekly.
Fill in the delivery details (see below).
Tick the fields to include under Export fields.
Select Save. You see Saved successfully and the export appears in the list.

Delivery details

For SFTP, all five boxes are required:

Host: the server name. Addresses on private or internal networks are refused with the message "Host is not allowed".
Port: digits only, from 1 to 65535. It starts at 22.
Username and Password. The password is hidden as you type; use the eye icon to show it.
Remote directory: must start with a forward slash, for example /incoming/recruit. Anything else is rejected with "The remote directory must start with '/'."

A required box left empty shows "This field is required." A port that is not a number shows "Enter a number."

The Test connection button is greyed out on a new export (hover over it for "Save the export before testing the connection."). Save first, reopen the export with the pencil icon, then select Test connection. It tries to log in to the server and reports Connection succeeded or Connection failed, waiting up to 10 seconds. It tests the details as last saved, not what you have typed since opening the dialog, so save any change before testing. When you reopen an export, the saved password appears masked. Leave it as it is to keep the existing password, or type a new one to replace it.

For Email, enter the Email address that receives the file. You can list several addresses separated by commas or semicolons. The email carries the subject "Your requested data export" followed by the file name, with the file attached. If the file is too large to send as an attachment, the run fails with "This export is too large to send by email. Reduce the field selection or use SFTP delivery." Choosing fewer fields, or switching to SFTP, fixes it.

Choose the fields

Fields are grouped in the picker. The column order in the file follows the order in which you tick them, and each column heading is the field label. Tick at least one field: an export with none produces a file with no columns.

Candidate & application: the standard fields from your application forms. Next to some you will see a page number (for example "Page 2") or the name of a repeating group, which tells apart fields that share a label.
Custom questions: questions written for individual jobs. Questions with the same wording on different jobs are combined into one field. Display-only content such as headings and notes is never offered.
Onboarding: fields from your onboarding forms. Display-only content is left out here too.
Job: Job Title, Department, Location, Employment Type, Working Pattern, Remote Policy, Salary (Min), Salary (Max), Salary Currency, Salary Period, Job Status, Industry Sector, Number of Positions, Published Date and Closing Date.
Offer: Offer Status, Offer Type, Salary, Salary Period, Salary Currency, Bonus, Start Date, Holiday Days, Hours Per Week, Notice Period, Signing Status, Sent Date, Expiry Date and Responded Date. If an application has more than one offer, the most recent one is used.

Identity columns such as first name use the candidate's record when an application has no stored answer of its own, so they are not left blank.

Fields that are no longer available to you

When you edit an export, a field you chose earlier may no longer be offered to you, for example a custom question that your role can no longer see. The picker then shows a notice such as "2 selected fields are not available right now. They stay part of the export unless you remove them." Select Review to list them. To take one out, select Remove beside it, then Confirm. Select Hide to close the list. Saving the export keeps those fields unless you have removed them.

Personal and sensitive fields

Fields that hold personal data carry a PII badge; hover over it to see whether the data is standard or protected. Equality monitoring questions such as gender, ethnicity and disability can be selected and are badged as protected. Every onboarding field is treated as personal data. If a question appears in more than one place and any copy of it is protected, the question is treated as protected.

The badges matter for redaction. Where a candidate came from an agency and has not yet been revealed to you, every badged field for that candidate, including identity columns such as name, is written as [Redacted] in the file instead of the real answer. Job and offer fields are not affected.

Fields that repeat

Some form sections let a candidate add several entries, such as emergency contacts or next of kin. In the export, these fields expand to one column per entry, headed with the field label and an entry number, for example "Next of Kin (1)" and "Next of Kin (2)". The number of columns matches the largest number of entries found on any application in that export. Applications with fewer entries leave the extra cells blank. You tick the field once in the picker and the numbered columns are created when the export runs.

Where several fields share a label, such as a "Surname" for the candidate and a "Surname" inside an emergency contact group, use the group name or page shown beside each field to pick the right one.

What is in the file

One row per submitted application, oldest first. Unfinished drafts are not included. Candidates who are currently hidden are left out. A file holds at most 50,000 rows. There are no filters on the export screen. You control the content through the fields you select and, for scheduled runs, the schedule options below.

In CSV files the six date fields (Published Date, Closing Date, Start Date, Sent Date, Expiry Date, Responded Date) are written as dd/mm/yyyy. In Excel files they are real date cells in the same format, and salary, bonus, holiday days, hours per week and number of positions are number cells. Every other value is text. Excel files keep leading zeros in values such as sort codes and account numbers. CSV files opened in Excel do not, so choose Excel (.xlsx) for that kind of data.

Schedules

Scheduled exports are checked once a day, overnight at 2am. An export is due if it has never run, or if at least a day (Daily) or seven days (Weekly) have passed since its last run. A new scheduled export therefore first runs at the next overnight check.

What a scheduled run contains depends on the delivery type:

SFTP: a full snapshot of every application, each time.
Email: only applications submitted in the last 24 hours (Daily) or 7 days (Weekly), so the attachment stays a manageable size. A short note under the email address box says this. If nothing falls in the period, no email is sent.

Once you choose Daily or Weekly, a tick box appears: Only include new records. With it ticked, each scheduled send includes only records this export has not sent before, and the 24 hour and 7 day limit on email no longer applies. Leave it unticked to resend everything in the period. Records for agency-redacted candidates go out as [Redacted] and are not marked as sent, so they are included again after the candidate is revealed. The tick box only affects scheduled runs. Run now and Download now always give the full set.

The time of a scheduled run is recorded when it starts, even if it then fails. A failed scheduled run is not repeated the next day. The export is tried again when its daily or weekly interval has passed. If you cannot wait, fix the problem and use Run now.

Switching an export on

Scheduled runs, Run now and the per-candidate email (below) only work on an export that is switched on. Data exports are currently set up by HireRoad support. Contact us to have a new export switched on. Download now works whether or not the export is switched on.

Run now

An SFTP export that is switched on has a play icon (Run now) on its row. Select it and you see Export run started. The file is built and uploaded in the background, and the result shows in Run history and in the last run date on the row. The file name is your export name with the date added, for example Weekly_payroll-2026-09-29.csv. Running it also resets the schedule timer for that export. If the request fails you see Failed to run export.

Download now

The download icon (Download now) builds the full file straight away and saves it to your computer in the export's chosen format. It ignores the schedule and the Only include new records option. You can request up to 10 downloads a minute. If it fails you see Failed to download export. Downloads are not listed in Run history.

Run history

The clock icon (Run history) opens the last 20 scheduled and manual runs for that export, newest first. Each shows the start time and either Delivered or Last run failed with the error text. An export that has not run shows "This export has not run yet."

Errors you are most likely to see are "Host is not allowed", a login failure from the SFTP server, and the email size message described above.

Send one candidate's data by email

If at least one Email export is switched on, a System Admin sees a Send candidate export button on the candidate's profile. It sits on the Onboarding tab. If your organisation does not use onboarding, the tab is called HRIS Sync when an HR system is connected, or Data export otherwise.

Select Send candidate export. The Export candidate data box opens.
If you have more than one email export, choose the Export configuration.
Select Send export.

The file goes to the recipient address or addresses on that export, not to the candidate. It holds the candidate's data from all their eligible applications in one file, using that export's fields and format. You can send it again at any time. Clicking twice sends it once.

You see Export email sent. when it works. If it cannot be sent, the message says why:

"This candidate has no application to export."
"That export configuration is no longer available. Refresh the page and try again."
"That export does not deliver by email, so it cannot be sent from here."
"That export has no destination email address. Add one on the Data Exports page and try again."
"That export is switched off, so nothing was sent. Switch it on from the Data Exports page and try again."

Any other failure reads Failed to send export.

Edit or delete an export

Select the pencil icon to edit. You can change any setting, including the delivery type and the fields, then select Save. Changes apply from the next run.

Select the bin icon to delete. You are asked to confirm with "Delete '[name]'? This action can't be undone." Deleting removes the export, its schedule and its run history. Data export deleted. confirms it.