Setting up reference requests and referee forms

Set up your referee and reference forms, collect referee details from candidates, send reference requests, and record the outcome.

References in Recruit run in two steps. First you get the referees' contact details, either from the candidate or by typing them in yourself. Then you send each referee a request containing a link to an online reference form. This article covers the whole route, from building the forms to recording your assessment. For the short overview, see the article "Requesting and managing references".

Who can do this

System Admins and HR users can build reference and referee forms, add referees, send requests, record references and save assessments. Members, Agency users, hiring managers and interviewers do not get these controls. If one of them opens the References tab on a candidate, they see a message saying references are managed by administrators and HR.

Referees never need a Recruit account. They work from a link in their email.

Set up your forms

There are two kinds of form, and both are optional. If you never create one, Recruit uses a built-in version of each.

Referee Form Templates collect the referee's details from the candidate.
Reference Form Templates hold the questions the referee answers about the candidate.

Both live under Settings, on their own cards.

Open Settings and choose Referee Form Templates or Reference Form Templates.
Select + Add Form.
Enter a Template Name (for example "Standard Reference Form") and a Description.
Use Add Field to build the questions. Pages, conditional show and required rules, repeatable groups and answer length limits are all available. File upload and signature fields can be used. Image and heading blocks cannot.
Save. You can also Duplicate a template, and each one shows how many times it has been used and when it was last used.

A referee form must always contain a required referee name and a required referee email, because those become the referee's record. New referee templates start with both already in place. If you remove them, the save is refused.

The built-in referee form asks for Name, Email, Company / organisation, Their relationship to you, and Contactable. The built-in reference form asks about the referee's role, how long they have known the candidate, in what capacity they worked together, dates of employment, strengths, development areas, whether they would rehire, and any other comments.

The request emails are templates too. Under Settings, Templates, the Referee Request (to candidate) and Reference Request categories hold the wording of the two emails, and the Reference Form Reminder reminder template holds the chaser.

Getting referee details

There are three ways a referee ends up on the candidate's References tab.

From the application form

If your application form has a References section, the referees a candidate enters are copied onto the References tab when they submit. No email goes to those referees at this point. You still have to request the reference yourself.

Ask the candidate to nominate referees

Open the candidate's profile and go to the References tab.
Select Request Referees. The Ask for Referees window opens.
Pick a Template for the email, and choose the Referee form the candidate will complete. If you choose neither, the defaults are used.
Edit the Subject and Message. The message must keep the placeholder, or Send Request stays disabled. and are also available.
Select Send Request. The email goes to the candidate's email address and is recorded on their timeline.

The candidate opens the link, sees "Nominate your referees", and can enter up to 10 referees before selecting Submit referees. Every required field must be filled in for every referee. The link works once. After a submission it shows a thank-you message instead of the form, so the candidate cannot add more through the same link. Each nominated referee appears on the References tab, but no reference has been requested yet.

Add a referee yourself

On the References tab, select Add Referee.
Enter Name and Email. Both are required. Name and company can each be up to 200 characters, email up to 320.
Optionally enter Company.
Under Contactable, choose Not recorded, Yes, may be contacted or No, do not contact. Not recorded is the default.
Select Add Referee.

To fix a typo later, expand the referee and select Edit. You can change the name, email and contactable answer. Changing the email address cancels any request that is still waiting, because the link already sent went to the old address. The card then shows a Cancelled badge and you need to send the request again.

Send a reference request

A request is tied to a vacancy. Recruit uses the vacancy you opened the candidate from, or their most recent application. If the candidate has no application at all, the tab says a reference form cannot be sent yet. You can still add referees and ask the candidate to nominate them, then send once the candidate is linked to a vacancy.

To send to one referee, expand their card and select Send Reference Request. To send to several at once, use Send Reference Requests at the top of the tab.
Choose a Template and the Reference form the referee will complete. The default reference form is used if you choose none.
Edit the Subject and Message. Use Merge fields to insert placeholders. The message must contain so each referee gets their own link. If you type a placeholder that reference requests cannot fill in, the window tells you and blocks the send.
If the job advert has attachments, tick Include advert attachments to attach some of them. The total size is limited, and Recruit asks you to choose fewer or smaller files if it is exceeded.
Under Send to, tick the referees. Everyone who has not yet been asked is ticked by default.
Select Send.

If a selected referee is marked Not contactable, a warning appears and you must tick I understand and want to send the request anyway before sending.

The referee's card now shows Pending. Each email is also recorded on the candidate's timeline. A referee can hold one request per vacancy, and trying to send a second gives "Reference request already exists for this referee and job". If a batch partly fails, the confirmation says how many referees it reached.

What the referee sees

The link opens a page titled Reference Form, headed "Reference for" and the candidate's first name only. The referee answers the questions, moving through pages with Back and Next if the form has more than one. Answers save automatically as they go, so a referee can close the page, return to the same link later and find their draft. File upload fields accept PDF, Word, RTF, plain text, OpenDocument text, PNG and JPEG files up to 10 MB. A text answer can be up to 5,000 characters, and any minimum or maximum you set on a question is enforced when they submit.

They finish with Submit Reference and see a thank-you message. The referee cannot edit a submitted reference. Opening the link again shows "Already Submitted". A link that was cancelled shows "Reference Request Not Found".

Record a reference received another way

For a reference given by phone or email, use Mark Received on the referee's card. It works whether or not a request has been sent. If one is pending, it is completed in place.

Select Mark Received.
Optionally choose files with Choose files. You can attach up to 5, in PDF, DOC, DOCX, RTF or TXT format.
Select Mark as received.

The reference is marked Completed straight away. If a file fails to upload, or is already attached to another reference, nothing is recorded and you can try again.

Review the reference and record the outcome

When a referee submits, or you mark a reference received, the card shows Completed. Expand it to read the answers, open uploaded files and see any attachments. Completed references are listed first on the tab.

Under Assessment, choose Satisfactory or Unsatisfactory, add Review Notes (up to 2,000 characters) and select Save Assessment. The outcome shows as a badge on the card, and you can change it later.

Two PDFs are available from an expanded card. Download referee details works at any point. Download reference appears once the reference is completed and contains the referee's details, their answers, the completion date and the outcome.

When a referee completes the online form, or you mark a reference received, Recruit emails a "Reference received" notice to System Admins and to HR users on that job's team. Each person can switch this off in their notification preferences.

Reminders

Recruit can chase referees who have not responded. Under Settings, Automations, Reference Form Reminder controls it. Turn it on with Enabled, then set Send after (hours or days after the request was sent), Max reminders and the channel. SMS is an add-on. Reminders stop once the reference is completed or the candidate's application is no longer active.

To chase a referee yourself, use Copy Link on a pending card and send the link on.

When to ask

Recruit does not tie references to an offer. Nothing in the reference tools checks the offer status, so you can request references before an offer, after a conditional offer, or at any point once the candidate has a vacancy. Your own process decides the timing.

Problems

The References tab shows only a message about administrators and HR. Only System Admins and HR users can view references.
Send Request or Send stays disabled. The message is missing or , the subject or message is empty, no referee is ticked, or a placeholder is not available in that email.
There is no send button on a referee. The candidate has no vacancy, or a request already exists. Cancelled requests can be sent again.
Cannot delete referee with an active reference request. Complete the request with Mark Received, or change the referee's email address to cancel it, then delete.
Deleting a referee also deletes all of their reference requests.
Historic record. Older references brought across from a previous system carry this badge. You can still assess them, but they cannot be resent or deleted.