Job application screening questions: what to prepare once and what to check every time

Most online application forms ask a familiar set of questions after the resume upload: notice period, start date, salary expectation, whether you can work in the country, whether you need sponsorship, and a block of voluntary questions about gender, ethnicity, veteran status and disability.

They fall into three groups, and each group deserves different handling:

1. Practical answers you can prepare once and reuse, adjusting per job.
2. Legal statements about your right to work, which you should recheck every time, because they are attestations and your situation can change.
3. Voluntary demographic questions, which you answer, or decline, fresh each time.

Group 1: answers to prepare once

Write these down once, in a note you can copy from, and adjust them per role.

Notice period

State it in weeks or months and say what it depends on: "Four weeks from signing" or "One month, negotiable for the right start". If your contract sets a long notice period, write the real figure rather than the one you think the employer wants, because it shapes the start date they plan around.

Earliest start date

A form usually wants a date. If you are employed, compute it from your notice period and give a date a week or two after an offer would plausibly arrive. If you are available now, say so plainly.

Willingness to relocate, and work arrangement

Answer the question the posting is asking. If the role is listed as hybrid in a named city and you will not move, "no" is the honest answer, even though it may end the application. Many job feeds state the arrangement in a structured field separate from the location text. The guide to reading a company's job board at the source shows where to find it.

How you heard about the role

Be specific. If someone referred you, name them where the form allows. Referrals are something recruiters can filter on: Greenhouse's talent filtering, for one, lists them next to location and education.

Salary expectation

This is the one to prepare most carefully.

• If the posting gives a range, anchor on it. Some application systems also publish the range the employer entered in their job data, even when the careers page does not show it.
• Give a range rather than a single figure, state the currency and whether it is gross annual base pay, and say if it depends on the total package.
• Know the difference between an expectation and your history. In the European Union, the Pay Transparency Directive (Directive (EU) 2023/970) gives applicants the right to receive the initial pay or its range, for example in the published job ad, before the interview or otherwise before pay is negotiated, and Article 5(2) says plainly: "An employer shall not ask applicants about their pay history during their current or previous employment relationships." Member states had until June 7, 2026 to write it into national law, so check how your country has implemented it. An expectation can still be asked.

Group 2: legal statements to check every time

"Are you legally authorized to work in [country]?"

Answer for the country named, not the one you live in. Right to work is national: a form for a job in Germany asks about Germany (EU, EEA and Swiss citizens have that right automatically), and one for a job in Toronto asks about Canada. If the company hires in several countries, the form may ask once per country.

The answer is a self-declaration at this stage; the employer verifies it later. In the US, employers must complete Form I-9 for every person they hire to verify identity and employment authorization. In the UK, you prove your right to work to the employer before you start, often with a share code. A wrong answer on the form does not survive that check.

"Will you now or in the future require sponsorship?"

This is a separate question from authorization, and it is easy to answer wrongly. "Sponsorship" means the employer would have to support a work visa for you: in the US, typically an H-1B petition; in the UK, a Skilled Worker visa, which requires an approved employer. If your current permission depends on a visa that will need renewing or changing, the honest answer to "now or in the future" may be yes even though you can work today.

Because this is a yes/no question, it is a common target for automatic rules. That is a reason to answer it carefully, not to answer it optimistically.

Age

"Are you at least 18?" Employers usually ask it to comply with age rules for the role. Answer it directly.

Group 3: voluntary questions to answer fresh, or decline

US employers often show a short questionnaire about race or ethnicity, gender, veteran status and disability. In Greenhouse it is an optional block the employer enables per job post: a "set of federally-approved questions" whose wording the employer cannot edit, described as voluntary (Greenhouse documentation).

Two points help you decide what to do with it:

• The US Equal Employment Opportunity Commission's guidance on pre-employment inquiries and race says that an employer that needs this information for affirmative action or to track applicant flow should keep it separate from the information used to judge whether a person is qualified, for example with a "tear-off" sheet. Application systems implement the same idea with restricted fields; Greenhouse lets employers mark questions private so only people with specific permissions see the responses.
• The questions are voluntary. Answering helps employers measure who applies and who gets hired; declining is a legitimate choice.

Whatever you decide, make the choice per application. These are not answers to store in a reusable profile or let a tool fill in for you.

Treat date of birth, national ID numbers and criminal history the same way. They are sensitive, the rules about when employers may ask differ by country and city, and the right answer depends on the job. Type them by hand when a form genuinely requires them.

A worksheet you can copy

Question	Prepare once?	Recheck when
Notice period	Yes	Your contract or situation changes
Earliest start date	Yes, as a rule ("notice plus two weeks")	Every application (it is a date)
Relocation, work arrangement	Yes, with your limits	The role's city or arrangement differs
How you heard	No	Every application
Salary expectation	Yes, as a range per role level	The posting gives a range; you move country
Authorized to work in [country]	Per country	Every application; any visa change
Require sponsorship now or in future	Per country	Every application; any visa change
At least 18	Yes	Never, in practice
Gender, ethnicity, veteran, disability	No	Decide each time
Date of birth, national ID, criminal history	No	Only when genuinely required; type by hand

Filling these faster without filling them carelessly

The repetition is the real cost: the same fields, typed into a new form for every application. The safe way to speed it up follows the three groups above.

Nimbae's optional browser extension, which works on Greenhouse, Lever and Ashby application forms, is built around that split. It fills reusable answers from a stored answer library. It fills work-authorization, sponsorship and age answers only after you have confirmed them, and treats a confirmation older than 180 days as stale. It never fills demographic, date-of-birth, national ID or criminal-history questions. It fills the form and stops: you review it and press Submit yourself.

Sources

• Greenhouse support: Auto-reject, Talent filtering, Enable EEOC questionnaire on job post, Privacy settings for form questions. Read October 18, 2026.
• Directive (EU) 2023/970 on pay transparency, Articles 5 and 34.
• US Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, Pre-Employment Inquiries and Race.
• US Citizenship and Immigration Services, I-9 Central and H-1B specialty occupations.
• GOV.UK, Prove your right to work to an employer and Skilled Worker visa.

This article explains common practice and cites official sources; it is not legal advice for your situation.