A company has apologised to a graduate jobseeker after saying she was ‘worth an interview, if only for a laugh’

BBC

Anna Jacobs.

The problem with emails is that your words can come back to haunt you.

There are certain faux-pas that make you look unprofessional, like accidentally hitting reply-all or spelling someone’s name wrong.

Sometimes, you can be caught being plain rude about somebody.

This is what happened at British company Tecomak Environmental Services, which was looking to hire an office administrator, reports the BBC.

An employee forwarded on an application to a colleague with some comments about the candidate in question, Anna Jacobs.

These included disparaging remarks about her being a “biscuit short of a packet or a left-wing loon tree hugger” and a “home educated oddball.” The Tecomak employee concluded that Jacobs was “worth an interview if only for a laugh.”

The trouble is, Tecomak accidentally attached these comments to an email when it responded to Jacobs. The candidate, from Kent in England, was not impressed and shared her story with the BBC:

“This absolutely awful summary was attached,” she said. “I thought: How dare somebody say that about my CV and myself.”

Business Insider has attempted to contact Tecomak for comment. The company’s website was down on Monday morning.

Ross Black of Tecomak apologised to Jacobs in an email, saying he understood it “must have been upsetting” to receive such comments.

“Clearly the comments were informal and not to the high professional standard you would expect from a company like ours,” he said in the email. “We genuinely felt your application and CV was interesting and you were shortlisted from a long list of over 40 candidates.”

He added: “We would be more than happy to interview you as one of the strongest candidates that have applied and, if you were to accept an interview, you can be assured that your application will be treated fairly and appropriately.”

However, Jacobs told the BBC she would not be attending an interview with Tecomak.

ICYMI: “Oddball…tree hugger”. A young woman got a shock when she opened an email from a prospective employer. More https://t.co/Bi577s0epo http://pic.twitter.com/WEaKZhn2LI

— BBC South East (@bbcsoutheast) May 15, 2017