Hiring process and onboarding

As of October 2026, the Employment Equality Acts 1998 to 2015 outlaw discrimination against job applicants on nine grounds. The Workplace Relations Commission lists them as gender, civil status, family status, sexual orientation, religious belief, age, disability, race (including nationality and ethnic origin) and membership of the Traveller community. We recommend leaving out questions about family plans, marital status, age, health or where someone is from, asking every candidate the same job questions and keeping your notes. This is HR advice, not legal advice. Where a complaint reaches the Workplace Relations Commission, we prepare you and the paperwork and work alongside your solicitor.

As of October 2026, no Irish law forbids the question, but that is expected to change. Article 5 of the EU Pay Transparency Directive says an employer shall not ask applicants about their pay history, and Head 5 of the General Scheme of the Equality (Miscellaneous Provisions) Bill, published on gov.ie in January 2025, would write that ban into the Employment Equality Act. The Bill has not been enacted, and the Department of Children, Disability and Equality confirmed in June 2026 that Ireland had missed the Directive's 7 June 2026 deadline. We recommend dropping the question now and telling candidates the pay range for the role instead.

According to Citizens Information, as of October 2026 a new employee must get a written statement of core terms within 5 days of starting. It includes the place of work, start date, job title, pay, normal hours and any probation period. The remaining terms, including paid leave, sick pay, pension and notice, must follow in writing within one month, and written details of the procedure before any dismissal within 28 days. These duties come from the Terms of Employment (Information) Acts 1994 to 2014, as amended, and the Unfair Dismissals Acts 1977 to 2015. We build all three into your offer pack.

It depends on the person. According to Citizens Information, since 1 January 2026 an employee aged between 23 and 60 who earns €20,000 or more a year across all employments, and who is not paying into a pension through your payroll, is automatically enrolled in MyFutureFund, and the employer must take part. For the first three years the employee and the employer each pay 1.5% of pay and the State adds 0.5%. Those are the rules as of October 2026. We are not pension advisers. What we do is put a pension step in your onboarding checklist, so payroll knows about every new starter from day one.

It depends on the scope: how many roles and interviewers are involved, whether you want the whole process designed or only interviewer training, and whether onboarding and probation documents are included. After the first call we set out the scope, the fee and the timings in writing. No work starts until you have agreed that document. If you also ask FH to recruit for the role, the recruitment terms are agreed in writing separately, so you always know which service you have agreed to.