There are plenty of services to send mail form the internet for a small fee, so this will only discourage the most poor candidates and add friction for the best ones.
The "small fee" is the point though as it stops practically all automated submissions. I doubt the price of a stamp excludes poor candidates unless you think that poor people could never get jobs before online applications were a thing (and internet connections and phones cost money as well).
It’s not that poor people can’t afford a stamp it’s that they aren’t going to spend money on an automated service or stamp if there are other places to apply to that don’t require this.
So I think it’s going to lower recall a a lot - it reduces volume of good and bad actors equally. Anecdotally, I’m not going to bother with such an application unless it’s my top choice or I’m desperate. For small companies that probably means throwing the babies out with the bathwater.
An interesting question but arguably a lot of the most qualified applicants will go FU at that point and only the most desperate will put a stamp on an envelope which is probably not what you want.
Honestly, it probably comes down to more networking and credentials.
There are plenty of services to send mail form the internet for a small fee, so this will only discourage the most poor candidates and add friction for the best ones.
The "small fee" is the point though as it stops practically all automated submissions. I doubt the price of a stamp excludes poor candidates unless you think that poor people could never get jobs before online applications were a thing (and internet connections and phones cost money as well).
It’s not that poor people can’t afford a stamp it’s that they aren’t going to spend money on an automated service or stamp if there are other places to apply to that don’t require this.
So I think it’s going to lower recall a a lot - it reduces volume of good and bad actors equally. Anecdotally, I’m not going to bother with such an application unless it’s my top choice or I’m desperate. For small companies that probably means throwing the babies out with the bathwater.
I don't know what the options are these days but MCI used to do it. Yeah, it's some friction on both sides.
An interesting question but arguably a lot of the most qualified applicants will go FU at that point and only the most desperate will put a stamp on an envelope which is probably not what you want.
Honestly, it probably comes down to more networking and credentials.
Adding more hops to the process you filter people so only desperate enough will apply. Excellent if you are looking for cheap labor!