This Woman Says Her Job Interview Was Canceled Because She Asked About Pay

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According to a tweet from Byrnes, after an initial phone interview where she was asked to come in for an in-person interview, she sent an email to the HR rep inquiring what the hourly wage for the position was and whether benefits would be included—pretty standard stuff and obviously super important to know. An HR rep from SkipTheDishes replied saying, “Your questions reveal that your priorities are not in sync with those of SkipTheDishes. At this time we will not be following through with our meeting this Thursday.” 

Applied for a job at @SkipTheDishes. They cancelled my interview b/c I asked about wages/benefits @CBC @CBCNews @ctvwinnipeg #boycottSkip pic.twitter.com/CjBdnFvY1P

— . (@feministjourney) March 13, 2017

The company doubled down on their statement in a follow-up, stating their start-up culture made them believe in “hard work and perseverance in pursuit of company goals as opposed to focusing on compensation,” according to the screenshot Byrnes shared on Twitter.

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Let’s get one thing straight: Asking about salary and benefits has nothing to do with whether or not you’re a self starter—it’s just plain smart. Job listings on SkipTheDishes‘ website do not provide details of compensation, and the only reported salaries on job site Glassdoor are for courier positions, which is not relevant to the job Byrnes was applying for.

What’s tricky though is when during the interview process you should expect to get details about salary and benefits. There doesn’t seem to be clear consensus about when to ask those questions—while Forbes contributor Liz Ryan advises people to get the salary question out in the open before a second interview, job advice site CareerBuilder suggests waiting until you are further along in the process before broaching that question. A survey from finance and accounting firm Robert Half found that 38 percent of employers were open to discussing salary and benefits in the second interview.

In a statement to CBC News, SkipTheDishes co-founder Joshua Simair denounced how the situation was handled, saying that they apologized to Byrnes and offered to reschedule the interview.