How to move recruitment onboarding paperwork online

Why paper and PDF onboarding slows agencies down

Paper packs and fillable PDFs ask every candidate every question, whether it applies or not. Answers arrive incomplete, someone chases them, and someone else re-types them into your recruitment system or payroll. The problem is rarely one form; it is the back-and-forth around it.

Start with an inventory

List every form and document a candidate sees between registering and their first shift. For each one, note:

• who sends it, and when
• who checks it
• where the answers end up: Giig, payroll, a shared drive
• what goes wrong most often

The form that causes the most chasing or re-keying is usually the best place to start.

Map the questions and the decisions

For your chosen form, write down every question and what depends on it. “Do you have a P45?” decides whether someone needs the starter checklist questions. “Have you worked with us before?” might decide whether you reuse details already on file. These decisions become the form’s conditional steps, so candidates only see what applies to them.

Design the online task

• Design for phones first, since many candidates will complete it on one.
• Show follow-up questions only when an earlier answer needs them.
• Pre-fill details the candidate has already given you, where that is agreed, and let them correct them.
• Explain why you need sensitive information, and ask for it only at the stage you need it.
• Keep your approved wording for declarations and agreements; plain-English help can sit beside it.
• Give a clear end: what happens next, and who will review it.

Review, corrections and signatures

Decide who reviews each submission and what “accepted” means. A reviewer should be able to accept a task, or ask for a specific correction, without the candidate starting again.

Where a document needs a signature, agree the signing approach for that document. Electronic signatures are widely used in the UK, but the right approach depends on the document, so take advice where you are unsure. A signature on its own is not an approval: your team still reviews the task.

Decide where every answer goes

A completed form does not mean every answer belongs in your recruitment system. Agree which details go to Giig or another system, which stay with the form under restricted access, and how long each is kept. Payroll and declaration details usually need tighter access than profile details.

What an online form does not replace

Some checks have their own legal process. An online form can collect information and prompt the right steps, but it does not replace a right-to-work check itself: follow the Home Office’s guidance on how those checks must be carried out.

Roll it out, then do the next one

1. Test it with a few real candidates and recruiters.
2. Fix the questions people found confusing.
3. Switch over, and retire the paper or PDF version so there is one route.
4. Watch how much chasing drops, and what still needs a phone call.
5. Pick the next form and repeat.