Are platforms reining in their recruitment?
The UK’s largest peer-to-peer lending platforms appear to be reining in their recruitment, with the majority of online job adverts having disappeared from their websites amid the coronavirus pandemic.
Assetz Capital has no vacancies online and a spokesperson confirmed that “recruitment is on hold for the time being while the economy equalises.”
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RateSetter does not currently have any vacancies online either, in comparison to last month when a few roles were advertised. However, Peer2Peer Finance News understands that the platform has not stopped recruiting as a matter of policy.
Meanwhile, Funding Circle and Zopa still have a handful of job vacancies advertised on their websites although this is substantially less than the number of roles on offer a month ago.
Funding Circle is advertising for an information security engineer and two investor support agents, one that speaks Dutch and the other German.
A Funding Circle spokesperson confirmed that it is advertising less roles but added that it was the same for everyone at the moment and not something they want to comment on.
Zopa is on the lookout for a collections agent, complaints specialist for auto finance, customer service specialist and sensitive case handler.
Clare Gambardella, chief customer officer at Zopa, said that the platform made many appointments to its operations teams before the Covid-19 outbreak.
“Prior to the coronavirus outbreak, we completed a drive for further people to join our operations teams,” she said.
“This has resulted in our teams being able to deliver even higher levels of support to customers during this uncertain period.
“Flexible working is a core part of the Zopa culture, which means we were well equipped to transition the whole Zopa team to working from home full-time.
“We’re leveraging our current expertise and focusing on helping our customers at this difficult time.”
Read more: Tackling the coronavirus challenge
Dan Hammond-Smith, divisional director at specialist fintech and technology recruitment firm Oakstone International, said he expected more firms to start hiring again after an initial slowdown in response to the pandemic.
“I can only see [recruitment] ramping back up as our clients become acclimatised to the situation they are in, depending how much the market has impacted them,” he said.
“Right now, most of our clients have started to work remotely and once they’ve adjusted to this set-up, many of them will still need to add value to their business.
“Clients have products and systems that need constant operational maintenance, support and development. Depending on where they operate the need for hiring into these companies will not change, it will however become a slower process.
“We’re very fortunate right now to have clients we’re hiring but we need to manage expectations in terms of timelines with candidates.”
Hammond-Smith suggested that some clients still want to move ahead with the recruitment process but they first need to adjust to working from home.
“Remote interviewing is not the norm and we need to be mindful of that,” he said.
“We have to make sure we’re completely visible and open in our communication with clients and candidates and respectful of everyone’s situation through this uncertain time.”