Expenses for Job Interviews

irlrobins

My sis is currently working in England but is hoping to return to Ireland to work. She applies for vacancies and often gets called for interview. Obviously this entails flying to Dublin, which at times can be expensive. For example, one company is interested in interviewing next week. But her flights will cost €200+.

What is the normal protocol for reclaiming this cost? Should she be expected to pay it herself? Or should the company be obilged to reimburse her? I know some companies are very good and prompt about offering to pay expenses. But others have been slow in offering or haven't done so at all? Anyone got any opinions?

R

seamus

It very much depends on the company. Personally I don't see why a company should pay travelling expenses for an interviewee - unless the company specifially chased the person down, or it's the third or subsequent round of interviews.

I know some companies will offer to pay back the costs if the interviewee is successful, whereas others will do the complete opposite and only refund you if they send you home.

If she's 100% about coming home, I would suggest saving as much as she can, moving home, and then jobhunting. That's my plan if I end up moving to London.

dermCu

I went the other way Dublin > London and ran into the same problem.
I got offered a few interviews but none of them offered to pay all my expenses. Two of them did offer to pay half. I thought that was fair enough. If they are genuinely interested they will at least consider it.

jhegarty

irlrobins wrote:

What is the normal protocol for reclaiming this cost? Should she be expected to pay it herself? Or should the company be obilged to reimburse her? I know some companies are very good and prompt about offering to pay expenses. But others have been slow in offering or haven't done so at all? Anyone got any opinions?

Unless she has some really special/rare skill she will be paying everything herself...

irlrobins

Thanks for the comments guys, appreciate it.

damnyanks

Maybe this is different but last year while applying for job's I was applying to programs as opposed to specific jobs. I rarely came across a company that refused to pay for my expenses and if they did I declined the interview.

So from my experience. Yes it is the norm. I got travel + Hotel covered usually.

RandomOne

I think it depends on the sector she's attempting to work in. If it's readily fillable within Ireland, why should a prospective employer pay for her to fly back - she wants that job, they want it filled by whoever can do it. Unless they advertised in the UK, they could hardly be expected to pay travel costs from UK.

justfortherecor

I went to a job induction course for a placement last february and we were asked to fill out a slip for expenses incurred in travelling. I put all of them in and then proceeded to add them up wrong (undervaluing the expense).

Got the money back 2 weeks later. Thank god no-one noticed, I was selected for an internship in Accounting!

BossArky

My first job straight from Uni was in France. The company paid for flights for an interview in Aug, and then again to fly me plus all my stuff over to France and put me up in a hotel for a month.

Second job in London, flights were paid for only, no relocation expenses as the job was only advertised in UK.

When I was a student every other company paid for everything. It is the norm unless the company is a mickey mouse outfit.

daveirl

This post has been deleted.

The Hill Billy

Has your sister asked for a telephone interview?
If that goes well they may ask her over for a face-to-face.
She could then broach the subject of expenses if the face-to-face is at their request.

irlrobins

Again, thanks all for replies.

Hill Billy wrote:

Has your sister asked for a telephone interview?

Yea was going to suggest this to her, save her some time. Also to ask what the expected salary is. On a few occasions she's gone for a interview only to find the salary is below her current one. Would have saved her wasting her time if she knew this beforehand.

tHE vAGGABOND

Just moved home from UK, with some good experience from my years abroad and did **** loads of telephone interviews from London..

The job I took [and Im in right this second] I took after 5 telephone interviews. It felt a bit weird taking a job never having met anyone connected with it or seen the offices, but that beats spending a few hundred quid I could better spend elsewhere [ie: the pub]

I got one offer of a face to face interview where he would pay my expenses, but the job was horrible so I said a polite no [job was managing 2 'farms of people' [his words, not mine] doing very basic software QA aka sweatshops, one in rural ireland somewhere and another in asia somewhere - I'd rather go on the dole than do that tbh]

jrey1981

I have had my train fares paid when I lived in the UK and went for interviews in London.

If it is a high enough paid job, or if she is an exceptional candidate for the job, I do not see why it should be unreasonable to request flight and perhaps hotel expenses, or at the very least a contribution of half of them.