Staff Application Form

What should a care job application form ask?

A job application form for a care role should collect what you need to shortlist fairly, and the records the law expects you to hold on each person you employ. The biggest of those is a full employment history, with a written explanation of any gaps. Schedule 3 of the care regulations asks for it, and this form gathers it in one place.

The form is written for care homes, home care and supported living.

What the form covers

It runs from Part A to Part L:

• The job and hours wanted

• Contact details, plus questions on driving licence, vehicle and business insurance for home care roles

• Employment history, including agency, self-employed and voluntary work, with a separate table for gaps

• Qualifications, the Care Certificate and any professional registration, such as nursing

• Why they want the job

• Two referees, one of them the current or most recent employer, and no relatives or partners

• The DBS check level for the role, interview adjustments and the privacy information applicants must get

• A signed declaration, an equality monitoring sheet and an office checklist

What it leaves out on purpose

The main form asks nothing about health or disability. Under the Equality Act 2010 you should not ask about health before a job offer, except where the Act allows it, so collect health information that bears on the role separately and later.

There are no visa or immigration questions either, so nobody is screened out because of how their nationality is perceived. You check right to work for all applicants in the same way, British citizens included. Criminal records are also asked about separately, at the right stage, and the form shows only the level of DBS check the job needs.

Before you send a job application form out

1. Add your service name and the job details.

2. Fill in all rows of Part I, the privacy information, including your lawful basis and how long you keep forms.

3. Remove the notes at the front, which are for the recruiting manager only.

4. Keep Part K, equality monitoring, as a separate sheet that shortlisting staff never see.

Check proof of identity, with a recent photograph, at interview. Part L gives the office a tick list for the Schedule 3 checks.

Two of those checks have their own records: the DBS Check Record & Certificate and the Right to Work Verification Record. Once you appoint someone, carry on with the Staff Induction Record & Checklist.