Every time a candidate is selected by a company after successfully undergoing the designated procedure, a confirmation mail with an associated offer/ appointment letter is sent to the candidate to accept or reject the proposal.
An HR manager has to draft an appointment letter and mail it to the selected candidate. It is one of the essential documents and serves as a binding document between the employee and the company.
Let us know more about an appointment letter and its significance.
What is an appointment letter?
An appointment letter is a well-established letter issued to an employer to an employee as the only legal document that ensures the candidate’s appointment for the specified post. As a response, the employee is expected to sign the document to confirm their acceptance of the job position by them.
An appointment letter can be provided as a hard copy or mailed to the respected employee. The employee can either reject or accept the letter as their choice.
After a brief overview of an appointment letter, let us dive into the details of a suitable appointment letter’s points.
Importance of an appointment letter
As an official document with legal jurisdictions shared between the employer and the employee, the appointment letter holds a particular significance and a crucial role.Â
The document that contains complete details from the job role to leave entitlement, this letter acts as an employment contract.
Both parties sign the letter of appointment and keep a copy of it. Before accepting the letter, the employee must go through the specified terms and conditions in detail to avoid any future misunderstandings.
An appointment letter can be used in court by either of the parties in case of any disagreement in the future.
After thoroughly going through an appointment letter, a candidate becomes well aware of his/her roles and responsibilities in the company and what the employer expects from him/her. By accepting the appointment letter, they agree to the terms and conditions of the employer. That’s why it’s important to thoroughly go through an appointment letter before accepting it.
Now, after all this information regarding the appointment letter and its importance, let us move on to how to accept an appointment letter.
How to write an appointment letter?
A good appointment letter is well written in an easy-to-read language with the necessary information regarding the job, roles and responsibilities, salary, benefits, etc., demonstrated clearly.Â
Some points to keep in mind for drafting a letter are:
- A standard header with the issuance date, company’s name, and address.
- A greeting and salutation preceding the candidate’s name, such as “Respected XYZ.”
- Opt for either the modern or the traditional style to draft the body of the letter. The classic style is the usage of long sentences, and the contemporary style is the usage of bullet points and small paragraphs.
- A brief description of the candidates’ day-to-day roles and responsibilities while working with the company is to be defined in a section.
- As discussed earlier, include the recipient’s joining date to cross-check any misunderstandings.
- Mention the details about the full-time or part-time role to be completed in hybrid, offline, or online mode.
- Include the details about the official salary offered to the recipient, as negotiated earlier in the interview or meeting.
- All other information, such as a specified company dress code or any other specification, should not be left out.
- Period of employment time, including the start date.
- The terms of probationÂ
- Terms of any employment code.
- Applicable legal jurisdiction governing the contractÂ
- Leave entitlementÂ
- End the letter by providing greetings.
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How to accept an offer letter?
An offer letter should be accepted subtly and professionally by writing a letter/email to the HR of the respected company.
An example of what the body of an acceptance mail should look like:
As discussed on the call yesterday, I am delighted to formally accept the offer and look forward to joining the team.
As discussed, my starting salary will be [as discussed], rising to [as discussed] following a successful probationary period of 3 months.
Thanks again for this opportunity. I am eager to contribute positively to the company and work with everyone.
I look forward to starting employment from [joining date]. If there’s any additional paperwork you need prior. Please let me know.
Thank you.
Make sure to follow proper salutations and greetings when writing the mail.
There are instances where a candidate has to decline an offer letter from a company, so let’s see how to politely and professionally decline an offer/ appointment letter.
How to decline an appointment letter?
From unsatisfactory salary to a disagreement with the terms and conditions of the company, there might be many reasons why a potential employee might deny an offer letter from a company. Even for refusing, a sophisticated manner should be opted by the candidate, an email to the company explaining the reasons for denying the offer provided by them.
Here’s an example of how the body of a mail for denying the offer from a company should look like:
I would like to express my gratitude to you for offering me a job as [job position] in your company. After carefully making a personal checklist, I have decided to decline the offer. I have carefully weighed the offer and concluded that [the reason for rejecting].
I am grateful for the opportunity and wish you and [name of the company] continued success. I hope we can stay in touch.
Make sure to follow proper salutations and greetings when writing the mail.
How to improve the acceptance rate of an appointment letter?
With a ton of resources available in the market, the employees have a ton of opportunities in hand to compare with and choose the best fit for them.Â
With this increased competition, the company needs an attractive appointment letter to make it considered among the potential candidates.
The best way to tackle low acceptance rates is to understand why candidates are turning you down. The reason may vary from low salary to more working hours, from less leave entitlement to location issues. The reasons are out of your hand to deal with, but some might be solved.
Recruiters can use some of the ways listed below to increase the offer letter acceptance ratio:
1. Competitive job offers
Providing a better job opportunity than your competitors will help you land more potential candidates. A better prospect can be salary, working hours, or anything else.
2. Screening candidates correctly
You’ll have to rethink your entire screening process to answer this question. It’s a waste to keep interviewing people who are uninterested or unavailable for the specified job.Â
While interviewing, ask them about your company and the job they are interviewing for. The answers in themselves will help you screen the potential candidates. You can later ask for their preferences for location and salary standards and match them with your company’s potential, dodging the candidates that do not meet the set standards. It’s useless to extend offer letters to such candidates and later get rejected by the same.
3. Communicate with the candidates
Make the candidates feel comfortable and involved while interviewing them by telling them about the company and its working environment, policies, and conditions. Just offering an appointment letter is not enough for a potential candidate to choose your company over others. Instead, communicating with them about the company’s positive and even negative aspects might make them more interested in your company, inclining them towards accepting the offer letter.
These are some of the golden points to keep in mind while sending out appointment letters to the candidates to get a favorable rate in acceptance of offer letters.
Example of an appointment letter
Date
To (Candidate’s Name),
Address
Dear[name]Â
This is regarding your application for the [job title] and subsequent discussions with us at the interview on [date] on the following terms and conditions.
Job position
Job location
Salary
Joining date
Working hours
Terms and conditions
[Company Name] congratulates you on your appointment and we look forward to support your professional growth and development.
Â
Sincerely
[company name]
In short, an excellently drafted appointment letter should contain all the information the candidate might need before joining his/her co-workers and clear all their confusion regarding their roles and responsibilities in this job.
Even though every company sends an appointment letter to their employees, the question is why?
The employee can also be told at a call that he/she has been selected for the specified job, then why put extra work into drafting, sending, and getting the letter accepted/signed by the candidate? Here comes the question of why an appointment letter is essential.
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