Help us recruit disabled candidates or you will lose our business — that was the unequivocal message to agency recruiters last night (13 September) from major employers BT and e.on.

At a BT-hosted event in London last night, top HR directors from the two employers challenged their recruiter audience to “change this unacceptable situation” of not supporting qualified disabled candidates to progress in job applications.

“It’s no longer acceptable,” said e.on HR director Maria Antoniou. “We ask you to reflect: what is the real cost of doing nothing at all?”

Antoniou went on to say that e.on had embraced a “mystery shopper” type initiative to determine which agencies were treating disabled candidates in an appropriate manner. She said that HR would “mandate” through the procurement process a requirement that its suppliers ensure their standards and processes were in line with e.on’s commitment to equality for disabled candidates.

Speakers at the event unveiled headline statistics from two surveys recently conducted by the Clear Company, which produces a toolkit for assessing attitudes towards disabled candidates. One survey involved questioning disabled candidates while the other focused on agency responses.

The research found that disabled candidates believe that they suffer from negative attitudes of recruitment agency consultants when applying for jobs. According to research results, nearly 75% of disabled candidates will not tell recruitment consultants about their disabilities for fear of a negative impact upon their applications.

Eighty per cent of disabled candidates would not, or were not sure if they would, ever use an agency again to seek work following their experiences with them, according to headline statistics from research conducted of agencies and candidates.

Agencies, on the other hand, feel they do not have the knowledge to effectively work with disabled candidates, the research showed.

BT’s director for people and policy, Caroline Waters, warned the audience of recruiters and fellow employers to “make no mistake”, eliminating barriers to employment for disabled candidates “will create a real competitive advantage”.