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CommodityQuant
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Posts: 57
Joined: July 5th, 2007, 6:16 am

Definition of "immediately available."

February 28th, 2017, 2:50 pm

I am expecting a quant job offer in London.  Since I live outside London (around 100 to 150 miles), I will need to relocate.
I have entered "Immediately available" in my application forms meaning I don't have a 12 week notice period.

When would be the latest time I could reasonably start?
Clearly the company is unreasonable if the company says "You said immediately available so we need you to start tomorrow."
Clearly the employee is unreasonable if the employee offers to start in 6 months having said "immediately available".

What are the guidelines?  1 week?  2 weeks?  1 month?  2 months?

Many thanks for your opinions.

Commodity Quant
 
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outrun
Posts: 4573
Joined: January 1st, 1970, 12:00 am

Re: Definition of "immediately available."

February 28th, 2017, 3:20 pm

It depends. I once started a project where some guy was leaving in 3 days and who was the only one knowing some company critical tasks. I started to work there even before the paper work was done.
I've also done projects where there was upcoming work, but just not yet, and so we agreed that I'd start in 2 months time.

So it would *not* be unreasonable for them to ask you to start tomorrow is they had the need and if you said you were available -and that they picked you over other candidates because of that-. I don't expect so because they would have checked it five times to make sure you were available. ("We have a lot of deadlines in the upcoming weeks, are you sure you can start right away?")

I would contact your future manager -not HR- and ask if you can start in x weeks so that you can organize the relocation, or if that's a problem. If it is a problem then it's up to you to make sure it gets solved: either stay in a hotel, or tell them that you're not the right candidate to solve "the urgent" matters.

The importing thing is to talk to your manager early on, you are going to be a team and he's going to need to be able to rely on you. No surprises.