The story of a Delhi jobseeker who travelled to Hyderabad for an interview, spending about ₹14,000 on flight tickets and reportedly being turned down in 10 minutes, has led to a wider discussion online about hiring practices, travel reimbursements and the growing desperation among candidates in a tough job market.A user on the r/delhi forum of Reddit shared the incident, saying he works in industrial fermentation and had been shortlisted for a fermentation-related role at a “major pharma company” in Hyderabad. The user did not name the company, later adding in the comments that his goal was to talk about the experience, not to target a specific employer.In the post, titled “Flew from Delhi to Hyderabad for an interview, spent ₹14k, got rejected in 10 minutes,” the user said he felt “cheated and angry” after travelling across the country for what he thought would be a serious technical evaluation.The Reddit user said that the company had shortlisted him after going through his profile and hence he assumed his experience was relevant enough for the role. “I thought they had gone through my experience and found it good enough to call me as they shortlisted me after seeing my profile,” he wrote.He said he took time off from work, prepared for several days and travelled from Delhi to Hyderabad for the interview, spending “almost ₹14,000 on flight tickets alone”. However, when he got to the venue, he said the process felt different from the start.“The minute I got to the interview place, something felt off,” he wrote. The candidate said he was one of the first to arrive and expected to be called early. Rather, he alleged that the HR people began interacting mostly in Telugu and called Telugu-speaking or local candidates ahead of him.“One after another, candidates were put in before me,” he wrote, observing that many interviews seemed to last around 20 to 30 minutes. When it was finally his turn, he said, “the interview lasted for about 10 minutes.The Reddit user said he answered the questions he was asked, but felt he wasn’t given a “real chance” to show his knowledge. No technical discussion in detail. No deep ferment questions. ‘No chance to really show what I knew,’ he wrote. “I saw him scrolling down to ‘not suitable’ on my form,” he said.“What frustrates me is that I didn’t feel rejected based on knowledge. “I felt rejected before the interview really even started,” he wrote in the post.The user admitted that he might be wrong and that the rejection might have been due to an experience mismatch. But he wondered what he had been up to on the short list if his profile was not suitable. “Why would you have somebody spend their money coming across the country to fire them in 10 minutes?” he said.He said he had checked with the company’s HR whether travel reimbursement was possible under the circumstances and was told there was no approval.Other Reddit users quickly responded to the post, with many discussing the fact that companies should pay for the travel of outstation candidates when calling them for an interview in person. Others said that if an employer is going to require a face-to-face interview in another city, they should either pay for travel or at least explain reimbursement policies upfront.“Name the company and why would you not ask the company to issue you the tickets??” wrote one commenter. “Yeah like what the f**k, it’s supposed to be sponsored by them,” another said. But not everyone was sold on automatic reimbursement. One user said that in a busy job market, companies often do not pay for travel because there are lots of candidates willing to turn up at their own expense.Some commenters said the candidate should have requested a video interview before booking flights. The original poster later added that he had emailed the company a week ago to see if an online interview was possible because of the work involved in traveling, but he didn’t hear back. “I travelled because the job market is hard and opportunities like this don’t come along often”, he wrote.The question of language and regional bias was also a sensitive topic for discussion. Local candidates appeared to get more time and attention, the Reddit user said, and some commenters shared experiences of their own of feeling at a disadvantage in interviews outside of their home states. Others warned against assuming bias just because an interview didn’t go well.“Do we assume bias if someone doesn’t crack an interview?” one user asked. Another commenter added, “Also, just because you made the shortlist doesn’t mean the job is yours.”The person then clarified that he never felt being shortlisted meant the job was in the bag. “It’s not the rejection that gets to me. It was that after flying across the country my interview was done in about 10 minutes while a few local candidates appeared to get much longer discussions. “I didn’t feel like I was actually evaluated before a decision was made,” he wrote.The user repeatedly refused to identify the employer. I don’t want to mention the name of the company…. I want to share about my experience, not to bash a specific employer. If I said the same name, it would very easily turn into speculation and accusations, and I’d rather not do that,” he said when asked by users to “name and shame” the company.The post highlights a growing tension in India’s white-collar and specialist job market: while candidates are increasingly willing to incur considerable financial and personal costs for opportunities, companies tend to keep hiring processes opaque. Uncertainty about travel reimbursement, interview format, number of rounds and evaluation criteria can make a job opportunity a costly gamble for candidates from outstation.The allegations in the Reddit post could not be independently verified and the company was not named, but the discussion echoes a broader frustration among jobseekers who feel employers need to be more transparent when asking candidates to travel long distances.The message for many users was a practical one: never assume you’ll get paid, get it in writing, ask for an online screening round first, and find out if the company will pay for travel before you spend money on flights.As one commentator put it, “Reimbursement is always being talked about for this reason.” The original poster’s reply was brief: “Lesson learnt….”
