Phone screen questions: what to ask before you schedule an interview

Before you schedule an interview, ask about two things: the practical facts that would end the process anyway, and the requirement the application left unclear. That means confirming the pay range, schedule and location still work for them, when they could start, and whether they’re still interested, then asking one or two questions about what they actually did. Ask everyone the same questions in the same order, take fifteen minutes, and rate the answers as soon as you hang up. Save the deeper questions for the interview, and leave out anything about pay history, health or personal life.

A phone screen is a short conversation with a narrow job. Done well, it stops you spending an hour-long interview on someone who can’t take the job at the pay you’re offering, and it rescues applicants whose resume undersold them.

What a phone screen is for

The screen of the applications told you who clearly meets your must-haves, who clearly doesn’t, and who is unclear. (If you haven’t done that yet, start with how to screen a pile of resumes.) The phone screen comes next, and it does three things:

1. Settles facts that end the process. If the pay range, the hours or the location don’t work for them, neither of you should go further.
2. Resolves what the application left unclear. “Assisted with month-end close” doesn’t tell you whether they ran it. A two-minute answer does.
3. Tells the candidate what happens next, so a good one doesn’t drift away while they wait. (See candidate ghosting.)

It is not a short interview. Judging how someone handles the job’s hardest problems is what the structured interview is for, and doing a rushed version of it on the phone gives you a weaker reading of the same thing.

The distinction can matter legally, too. In Ontario, employers who interview an applicant for a publicly advertised job must tell them within 45 days whether a hiring decision has been made. The province’s guide says an interview “does not include a preliminary screening”, such as “a phone call to confirm that the applicant meets the minimum qualifications for the position, or to clarify information provided in their application.” A call that assesses suitability after that point may count as an interview (Ontario Ministry of Labour). Keeping the phone screen to its narrow job keeps that line clear.

The questions

Five groups, in this order. The wording is ours, and you should adapt it to the job.

1. Confirm the basics, by telling them first

Start by saying the facts yourself, then ask if they still work: “Before we start, the role is full-time in our [city] office, Monday to Friday, and the range is $X to $Y. Does that still work for you?”

Telling them first is faster than asking open questions, and it’s what applicants expect. In iHire’s 2026 survey of U.S. job seekers, 75.4% said they expect job ads to include a salary range, and 56.3% expect them to make clear whether a role is in-person, remote or hybrid (iHire). If your posting already said so, you’re confirming; if it didn’t, this is where people find out.

2. Practical facts

Ask	Why
“What are you looking for in pay for this role?”	Expectations, not history. See below.
“If we made you an offer, when could you start?”	Notice periods vary and can decide between two finalists.
“The role needs [the schedule as posted]. Can you work that?”	A stated requirement, asked of everyone in the same words.
“Are you legally entitled to work in [country]?” (only if the job requires it from day one)	Ask the yes/no question, not citizenship or birthplace.
“Are you still looking actively? Is anything else moving quickly for you?”	Tells you how fast to move, not whether they’re committed.

The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission’s guidance confirms that an employer “may state its attendance requirements and ask whether an applicant can meet them” (EEOC). On work authorization, the Ontario Human Rights Commission accepts “Are you legally entitled to work in Canada?” on an application form (OHRC); questions about citizenship, birthplace or where someone’s experience was gained are a different matter.

3. The unclear requirement

This is the question that makes the call worth having. For each must-have the application left unclear, ask a past-behaviour question about it: “Your resume mentions [their words]. Walk me through the last time you did that. What did you do yourself, and what did others do?”

Use the same wording for every candidate who was unclear on the same requirement. If someone says “we”, ask what they did. You’re listening for the specifics a person who did the work can give without effort: the steps, the tools, what went wrong and what they did about it.

4. One question about the job, for everyone

Pick the most important must-have and ask every candidate the same short past-behaviour question about it, even those whose resume already showed it. It gives you one comparable answer across the whole group. Keep it to one; more belongs in the interview.

5. Their questions, and what happens next

Leave five minutes for their questions, then tell them exactly what comes next and when: “We’re finishing calls this week and will let everyone know by Friday the 14th whether we’re moving forward.” Then keep the date.

Questions to leave out

• Pay history. California law generally bars employers from seeking an applicant’s salary history, though it allows asking about their “salary expectation for the position” (California Labor Commissioner). New York City has banned salary-history questions, including in interviews, since 2017 (NYC Commission on Human Rights). Other places have similar rules. Asking about expectations works everywhere and tells you what you actually need to know.
• Health and disability, before an offer. Under the ADA, an employer “may not ask disability-related questions” until after a conditional job offer. You may ask whether a candidate can perform the job’s functions, “with or without reasonable accommodation” (EEOC).
• Personal life. Age, family plans, childcare, religion, national origin and similar topics have no place in a screen. Our guide to screening questions covers the wider list.
• Low-value classics. “Tell me about yourself” and “What’s your biggest weakness?” aren’t unlawful. They just use time without settling anything you couldn’t learn better in the interview. That’s our view, not a research finding.

Employment law differs by country, state and province. Check what applies where you hire.

A fifteen-minute script

Minutes	What happens
0–2	Introduce yourself, say how long the call will take and what it covers
2–4	Confirm the basics: pay range, schedule, location (group 1)
4–7	Practical facts (group 2)
7–11	The unclear requirement, if any, and the shared job question (3 and 4)
11–15	Their questions; tell them what happens next and by when (group 5)

Write notes on what they said, not your impression of them. If you’re doing twenty of these, the notes are the only way the fifteenth call is judged by the same standard as the second.

Rating and deciding

Rate straight after the call, before the next one. Three levels are enough:

• Clear evidence: specific about what they did, in a way that meets the requirement.
• Some evidence: relevant, but partial or vague when you followed up.
• None: couldn’t describe doing it, or described something else.

Then make one of three calls: invite to interview, hold (good, but others are stronger; tell them when you’ll decide), or decline. A fact that doesn’t work (pay, schedule, a required licence) ends the process for both sides; a lukewarm feeling about someone’s manner doesn’t. Write one line for each decision, so you can explain it later.

Keep phone-screen ratings separate from interview ratings. They’re different conversations with different questions, so averaging them mixes two things. The phone screen decides who gets an interview; the interview decides who gets the job. (That’s our recommendation; see how to keep interview scores consistent for combining interview ratings.)

A worked example

Larkspur Partners, the fictional accounting firm in our guides, is hiring a Senior Accountant. Its must-haves are a CPA designation and running a month-end close independently. The details below are invented for illustration.

One applicant’s resume showed the CPA and said “assisted with month-end close for a three-entity group”, so the close was unclear. On the call:

• Basics and facts: the range and office days worked; four weeks’ notice.
• Unclear requirement: asked to walk through the last close, she said she had run the close for two of the three entities for the past year, kept the close calendar, and handed the consolidation to her manager. Asked what went wrong most recently, she described an intercompany balance that didn’t match and how she traced it. Clear evidence.
• Decision: invite to interview. Her resume undersold her, and the call took twelve minutes.

Without the call, she was one of the “unclear” applicants who quietly don’t make the shortlist. That’s the failure the phone screen exists to prevent.

Where SortTheStack fits

SortTheStack doesn’t make phone calls. It does the step before: each application is marked against your requirements as met, not met or unclear, with the text from the application quoted, so the unclear ones arrive with the exact words you need for question 3. Silence on a must-have makes an applicant Possible, not a reject. When you’re ready, you can send a candidate an interview invitation with your own scheduling link, such as a Calendly, Google or Microsoft booking page, from their record. See how the screening works.

Sources

• Ontario Ministry of Labour, Requirements related to publicly advertised job postings, accessed 1 November 2026.
• iHire, The State of Online Recruiting 2026, accessed 1 November 2026. Survey of U.S. employers and job seekers drawn from iHire’s own databases, July and August 2026.
• U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, Enforcement guidance: Preemployment disability-related questions and medical examinations (1995), accessed 1 November 2026.
• Ontario Human Rights Commission, Designing application forms, accessed 1 November 2026.
• California Labor Commissioner’s Office, California Equal Pay Act and Pay Transparency Law: Frequently asked questions, accessed 1 November 2026.
• NYC Commission on Human Rights, Salary history questions during hiring process are illegal in NYC, accessed 1 November 2026.