The Royal Mail has awarded what could be the largest ever online testing contract – to assess more than 200,000 applicants.

Assessment specialist PSL has been asked to design two bespoke psychometric tests: a personality questionnaire and a ‘sorting simulation’ test, both of which will be delivered online via PSL’s test delivery engine.

One or both of these instruments will be used to help deselect potentially unsuitable applicants from the 125,000 that apply for frontline positions each year.

The Royal Mail – which currently employs over 196,000 people – has switched to online assessment to enhance efficiency in the recruitment process.

Matthew Mee, head of resourcing at Royal Mail said: “Each year we have over 125,000 people who express an interest in joining Royal Mail Group – more than any other organisation in the UK.

“With such large numbers it is imperative to make the switch to online recruitment and introduce effective and job relevant sifting tools.

“We need to deselect the candidates least likely to be suitable from the recruitment process as soon as possible. This will allow us to improve the quality of candidates coming through the assessment pipeline – and ultimately will ensure we are recruiting the best available people to deliver services to our customers.”

PSL has been conducting research into the security of online testing and says it is possible to tell when an applicant has had help to answer a questionnaire.

The company says it is possible to assign marginal probabilities to candidates’ scores and then work out whether their response patterns are unusual.