A phone call is the most expensive part of hourly hiring — fifteen minutes each, mostly to discover something that could have been a one-line answer. These are the four facts worth having first.
The four
1. Can they work the hours?
Ask for their availability in their own words. More calls end here than anywhere else.
2. Can they get there, on the worst shift?
Not the normal shift. The early one, the Sunday, the one that overruns.
3. Do they hold the ticket the job needs, and is it current?
Name it exactly, and ask for the expiry.
4. When could they start?
Catches the notice period and the booked holiday before you have invested anything.
What not to put before the call
Anything that needs a conversation. Why they left the last job, how they handled a difficult shift, what they would do in a scenario — those are worth your fifteen minutes and are poor written questions. The pre-call questions exist to make sure the fifteen minutes is spent on someone who can actually take the job.
And keep it to four. Every extra question loses applicants, and an hourly candidate is usually applying to several places from a phone.
Use these without us
Copy any of the questions above into whatever you already use — they work on paper, over the phone, or in a text message. They are here because they are the ones that decide an hourly hire, not because they are ours.
If you would rather not collect the answers by hand, make a screening link: paste the job, keep these questions or write your own, and applicants answer on their phone. The answers come to your inbox and your reply goes straight to them. Free, no account, no card.
