General guidance about how to complete the vacancy request can be found within the 'Support' section on Trac.
Once in the user guide you can select the relevant section of the form for further information.
A video tutorial is also available on the Trac website.
Before completing a vacancy request, please ensure the vacancy has the approval to be advertised.
The below guidance sets out key information that is required to ensure vacancies are easily identified and approved without delay. This includes specific requirements for the;
- department,
- cost code,
- job reference number,
- position number.
| New Vacancy Request | |
|---|---|
| When initially selecting 'New vacancy request' within Trac, you will be required to provide the following information. | |
| Department |
This determines which application form is used for the vacancy. The list will contain the following:
|
| Band / Grade | Select the relevant band / grade as evaluated. |
| Disciplines |
To select the disciplines follow the below steps:
|
| Similar Vacancies |
Once the details of the vacancy have been entered, you will be given the option to use a template of a similar existing vacancy as the base for the new vacancy. If you choose to use a similar vacancy you will be able to edit the content before you submit it for authorisation. To use an existing vacancy, click on the radio button next to the job title and select 'Continue' to proceed to the next stage. Please be advised, only vacancies which have previously been approved through the full authorisation process will display as a 'similar vacancy'. |
Once complete, you will need to provide the vacancy details by completing each tab, located at the top of the Trac page before submitting your vacancy request.
The following information provides instructions about how to complete each tab of the request.
| Authorisation | |
|---|---|
|
Further guidance on Authorisation can be found on the Trac Website. |
|
| Cost Code |
Code for the department budget that the costs of the new post will be deducted from. All cost codes are built into Trac, if your cost code is not included, please email hr@hssib.org.uk. |
| Position Numbers |
If recruiting to an existing role enter the position number here. If you are the employee's supervisor in ESR you will be able to view their current position number on their ESR record. If you do not have the Position Number or if it needs amending, please email hr@hssib.org.uk. Vacancy requests will be rejected if the Band on the ESR position number, Trac and/or the Job Description do not match. |
| Full-time Equivalent |
Enter the full-time equivalent (FTE) of the role. Please ensure you enter the full FTE the successful candidate(s) will be working. Vacancy requests will be rejected if the FTE on Trac exceeds the FTE on the position number. |
| Job Ref | The job reference number will be entered by HR Shared Services (HRSS), please leave this blank. |
| Job Title |
This should be an exact match to the Job Title on the Job Description and must match the Electronic Staff Record (ESR). If the Job Title in ESR does not match the Job Title you entered in Trac you must contact hr@hssib.org.uk to request an update to ESR; providing conflicting information may result in a delay to your recruitment. Vacancy requests will be rejected if the Job title entered in Trac does not match the Job Description uploaded to Trac. |
| Reason for vacancy request | Details entered here provide Authorisers with information as to why this post is required. |
| Where is the funding for this post being generated? |
Enter relevant information, for example, project, leaver etc. Vacancy requests will be rejected if the funding is not explained. |
| If the job description is new or updated, has the post been evaluated or a template job description used? | Enter 'Yes' or 'No' within this text box. |
| Please confirm the name of your budget holder (Band 9+) and confirm they have provided their approval to commence their recruitment. | Enter the relevant information within this text box. |
| Please state the reason number for the fixed-term contract from the below list. |
Enter N/A for permanent roles. Vacancy requests will be rejected if the fixed term reason is excluded. |
|
Have you used the expression of interest process to advertise your role to internal candidates? |
Enter ‘Yes’ or ‘No’. |
|
Where the Job Title in ESR does not match the Job Title you are providing within this vacancy request (Trac), please confirm that you agree to contact the hr@hssib.org.uk to request that the Job Title in ESR be updated prior to any successful candidate(s) being appointed: |
Enter ‘Yes’ If the Job Title in ESR does not match the Job Title you entered in Trac you must contact hr@hssib.org.uk to request an update to ESR; providing conflicting information may result in a delay to your recruitment. |
| Target employment start date | A provisional date may be entered however this is not a definitive date. |
| Advertising Scope |
Select the intended audience for the advert. If unsure, please review your Organisational Policy or speak to a HR Advisor. Public - Advertised on NHS Jobs, Health Jobs and other third-party advertisers. Internal - Advertised on Health Jobs and it will be marked as restricted, with a note indicating this role is only available to internal applicants. Restricted - Do not select, any vacancies with this selected will be rejected at the authorisation stage. |
| Authorisers |
This is the authorisation path, enter the names and email addresses of the people/teams approving the vacancy. Authorisers are emailed for approval in number order which is set using the numbers on the right-hand side, for example, the number 1 should be entered next to the name and email address of the Trac approver. The next authoriser in the path will not be emailed until the previous authoriser has given their approval. If you are requesting a public, internal or restricted advert, please ensure you enter your authorisation panel in the order shown here:
If you require any assistance in completing this request, please contact HR Shared Services by emailing hssib.hrqueries@nhsbsa.nhs.uk. Please note each approver has one working day to review your request in the order shown above. Once your vacancy is fully approved, the advert will be published online the next working day. |
| Vacancy Details | |
|---|---|
| Contract Type |
Select the relevant Contract type from the dropdown, for example, Permanent, Fixed term etc. |
| Additional contract details (if required) |
If the Contract type selected is not permanent, please enter the length of the contract type, for example, 'for XX Months/Years’ or ‘until DD MMM YYYY' |
| Working Pattern (Hours) |
Select from the following:
All other options form part of HSSIB Flexible working policy, therefore those roles should be advertised with the Flexible working pattern. |
| Hours / sessions per week |
Enter the number of hours for the role per week, for example, ‘Full time 37.5 hours per week’. |
| Grade (display) | The band/grade of the role being recruited. If ESM, please ensure you enter whether this is ESM1, 2, 3 or 4. |
| Min grade (search) | If an applicant is searching by band/grade, this is the minimum band/grade they can enter in their search that will return this vacancy. |
| Max grade (search) | If an applicant is searching by band/grade, this is the maximum band/grade they can enter in their search that will return this vacancy. |
| Salary period |
Select the relevant option from the dropdown. When 'Yearly' is selected, additional rate options will appear. Please ensure that 'Base rate' is selected. |
| Salary range | Enter the salary range of the band/grade for this role. When these are automatically generated the range will be determined by what is entered in the Min grade (search) and Max grade (search); please ensure that you amend this field to state the bottom and top of the ‘Grade (display)’ as this is what will appear on your advert. |
| Additional salary details | Enter 'per annum' if Full time or 'per annum pro-rata' if Part time. |
| Salary details preview |
This will show the salary as displayed on the advert, it must be the base rate salary range in the following format. (Bottom of the band) – (Top of the band) per annum Vacancy requests will be rejected if the salary range is not the ‘Grade (display)’ base rate salary range. |
| DBS Check required |
Select the relevant option from the dropdown. If required, the Job Description will be used by Trac to countersign the request. Please refer to the DBS eligibility guidance to understand if the role requires DBS clearance, as requesting an unwarranted DBS check will causes delays during the pre-employment checking stage. This will generate an automatic message on the advert to alert applicants. If a standard or enhanced DBS is required, please complete the additional boxes that become available. |
| UK professional registration | Select 'Yes' or 'No' from the dropdown. This will generate an automatic message on the advert to alert applicants. |
| Occupational health requirement | Select the relevant option for the role. |
| Advertising start date |
No action required. This field automatically defaults to the current date when the advert goes live. |
| Closing date |
Select the date which you would like the advert to close. The following minimum advert length is applied depending on the advertising scope: Internal – 5 Working days. External – 20 Workings days. Please note, once advertised you will receive an email confirming to exact closing date, this can be amended upon request. |
| Closing Time | The time should always be midnight. |
| Proposed interview date |
Please ensure you enter a future date; this will display on the Trac and NHS Jobs advert. Consider the time to authorise, advertise, shortlist, and set up interviews when including a proposed interview date. |
| Vacancy site | Enter Home Based. |
| Vacancy street address | This information is not required. |
| Vacancy town | The geographical location of the role. Flexible/homeworking roles still require an actual town. |
| Vacancy postcode |
Enter BH16 6FA. This will determine the vacancy location on NHS Jobs (only one postcode will be accepted). |
| Payslip address | Please leave blank, HRSS will complete this. |
| Counties |
This determines the advert location when searching a vacancy, will default to the county in which the employer is based. Add up to 4 counties to widen your search option on Trac (does not affect adverts published on NHS Jobs). |
| Advert Details | |
|---|---|
|
Further guidance on Authorisation can be found on the Trac Website. All text entered into the 'Advert details' tab will be displayed on the live advert. |
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| Advert details | This information will be shown when the vacancy is advertised and is split into three sections. For all sections enter the text you wish to display in the live advert. Note: Do not copy and paste text with formatting such as bullet points directly from a Word document into Trac as Trac cannot replicate this. To remove the formatting, text should be copied into Notepad first, bullet points and other formatting can be added once your text is within the Advert box field using the formatting toolbar. |
| Job Overview |
Use this section to provide an overview of the team and/or directorate/region that the role is located in and a high level summary of how this role contributes to the overall delivery. This information may be available in the Job Description’s ‘Job Summary’. This section has a minimum word limit of 100 characters and a maximum of 1,500 characters, including spaces. |
| Main Duties of the Job |
Use this section to give a brief description of the role – you may wish to refer to the ‘main duties’ section of the job description to produce a short summary of the role. This section has a minimum word limit of 100 characters and a maximum of 1,500 characters, including spaces. |
| Working for your Organisation | The section will be pre-populated, you must not add to this wording or amend in any way. |
| Job Description | Copy and paste the wording from the Job Description in this section (do not include the Person Specification wording as this will be entered in the Role Requirements section). There is a character limit of 100 to 10,000 characters. If the wording in the Job Description is over 10,000 characters, please only add an extract and add a sentence to the start of this section to make it clear that the full detail can be found in the attached Job Description. |
|
Contact name Contact job title Contact email address Contact telephone number |
Enter the details of the person that applicants can contact for further details/informal visits. |
| Additional contact information | Enter any additional contact information if required. |
| Primary speciality | The main speciality of the post, this is displayed on the live advert. Avoid using acronyms or abbreviations with which external applicants may not be familiar. |
| Staff group | Select the staff group that matches the discipline entered below. |
| Disciplines | This defaults to the disciplines selected when you first created the vacancy request. |
| Documents | |
|---|---|
| Trac guidance about completing the documents tab can be found on the Trac Website. | |
| Public Documents |
Upload the Job Description (JD) and Person Specification (PS) in this section. All documents uploaded within this section will be available for applicants. |
| Internal Documents |
The documents uploaded to this section will not display to applicants however, will be accessible for authorisers to view. You may wish to submit your business case document within this section. |
| Longlisting | |
|---|---|
| This section does not need to be completed. |
| Shortlisters | |
|---|---|
| Trac guidance about completing the shortlisting tab can be found on the Trac Website. | |
| Shortlisting Panel |
When listing the shortlisting panel, please list the Lead Shortlister at the top. All shortlisters entered will be required to shortlist all applicants. |
| Interviewers | |
|---|---|
| Trac guidance about completing the interviewers tab can be found on the Trac Website. | |
| Interview Panel |
Please be advised the interviewers entered will be identified as ‘provisional interviewers (from authorisation)’ throughout the system until they are confirmed by the Lead Shortlister during the interview set up later in the recruitment. |
| Role Requirements | |
|---|---|
|
This is where you will enter the requirements for the role from the Person specification. This information will be used to assess the applicant during the shortlisting stage. Please note that this information will be available for the candidate to view and once the advert is published cannot be updated/amended. You should add all the role requirements that you will use for shortlisting. |
| Questions | |
|---|---|
|
Application questions are on the ‘Questions’ tab when creating a vacancy request. The questions form part of the recruitment process. Questions that are not listed cannot be added. To add questions to an advert a process change request will need to be sent to the HRSS Business Improvement (BI)team to amend the questions required for an advert. Trac will not action any requests for questions to be added unless the request is sent from the BI team. |
| Notes | |
|---|---|
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You will see any notes that have been added to the vacancy here; please do not add any additional information here regarding your vacancy request. If you have any additional information that is not requested as part of the request , you must email this to HRSS through the vacancy in Trac or using the generic email address. If you have amended a vacancy request and resaved it, Trac will not allow you to proceed onto the next step without adding a note. This will be highlighted in pink. For further guidance, please see below under ‘Error Messages.’ |
| Request Authorisation | |
|---|---|
|
Once you are happy that the details of the new vacancy are correct, select ‘Request authorisation’. This will send a notification email to the first Authoriser on the list informing them a vacancy request has been submitted which requires their approval. |
| Error Messages | |
|---|---|
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If you are attempting to submit the vacancy however you get an error message highlighted in pink, please view the Trac support guidance within the ‘Support’ section under ‘Error message appearing when submitting the vacancy authorisation request.' |
| Saving a vacancy to draft | |
|---|---|
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If you are unable to complete the vacancy request and want to save your progress you can save the vacancy as a draft by clicking the ‘Save draft’ button at the bottom of the page.
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| Further information and Guidance | |
|---|---|
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A video tutorial is also available on the Trac website. |