Common CV mistakes in the UK (and how to fix each one)

Most UK CVs are not rejected for one glaring flaw. They are binned in the first ten seconds for a handful of small, fixable mistakes: describing duties instead of results, no numbers, tired cliches, typos, the wrong length, a messy format, and a generic profile that could belong to anyone.

Here is each one, why it costs you, and a concrete before-and-after fix.

1. Duties instead of results

This is the mistake almost everyone makes. You list what the job involved rather than what you actually achieved. The reader already knows roughly what a warehouse operative or an office administrator does. What they cannot see is whether you were any good at it.

• Before: "Responsible for handling customer enquiries."
• After: "Handled 60+ customer enquiries a day, keeping a 95% same-day resolution rate."

Start bullet points with an action verb (managed, cut, built, trained, delivered) and end with an outcome. There is more on this in how to tailor your CV to a job.

2. No numbers

A CV with zero numbers reads like an opinion. Numbers make a claim checkable, and checkable claims get believed. You do not need a corporate job to have them.

• Retail: "Processed £2,000+ in daily takings with no till discrepancies."
• Hospitality: "Served 120 covers a shift during peak service."
• Admin: "Booked and managed diaries for a team of 8."
• Warehouse: "Picked and packed 300+ orders a shift to a 99% accuracy rate."

If you genuinely cannot measure something, use scale instead: team size, number of sites, volume of stock, frequency. Anything concrete beats a vague adjective.

3. Cliches and empty phrases

"Hard-working team player with excellent communication skills" tells a recruiter nothing, because every other applicant wrote the same sentence. These phrases feel productive to write and do no work at all.

• Cut: hard-working, team player, results-driven, go-getter, think outside the box, excellent communicator.
• Replace with evidence: instead of "excellent communicator", write "Wrote the weekly rota and briefed a team of 12 each Monday."

The rule is simple. If a phrase could sit on anyone's CV, it is not earning its place on yours. Your personal statement is where cliches gather most, so it is worth rewriting first.

4. Typos and sloppy grammar

A single typo can end an application before the rest is read, especially for roles where accuracy matters. Recruiters take it as a preview of your work.

• Read the CV out loud. Your ear catches what your eye skims.
• Set your spellchecker to British English so it flags "color" and expects "colour".
• Check the basics people miss: consistent tense, consistent date format, the company name spelled correctly in your cover letter.
• Get one other person to read it. You cannot proofread your own writing well, because you read what you meant to type.

5. Wrong length

Length is a quiet signal about judgement. Too long and you look unable to prioritise. Too short and you look thin.

Two pages is the UK norm. If yours runs to three, you are almost certainly keeping old roles at full length that should be trimmed to a line or two. More detail in how long should a CV be.

6. Bad format

Fancy templates with photos, colour sidebars and icons look impressive on screen and fall apart when an employer's applicant tracking system tries to read them. Text in a graphic or a two-column layout can come out scrambled or blank.

• Use a single column, clear headings, and a standard font.
• Save and send as a PDF unless the advert asks for a Word document.
• Skip the photo. UK employers do not expect one, and it can raise unconscious bias questions.
• Name the file properly: "Jane Smith CV.pdf", not "cv final v3 REAL.pdf".
• Check it reads cleanly on a phone, because many first sifts happen on one.

7. A generic profile

A one-size-fits-all CV fired at every advert is the slowest way to job-hunt. The opening profile and your bullet points should echo the language of the specific advert. If the job asks for "stock control" and "shift leadership", those exact words should appear where they are true for you.

This is where a quick keyword check pays off. Paste your CV and the job advert into the free checker below to see which of the advert's key terms you are missing before you send.

Then rewrite your top three bullets and your profile so the words that matter for that role are actually present. This one habit lifts more applications past the first sift than any template ever will. If you are working with a thin history, writing a CV with no experience and a CV for a warehouse job show how to do it without padding.

The quick self-check

Before you send any CV, run it past these seven:

• Does every bullet show a result, not just a duty?
• Are there real numbers?
• Have you cut every cliche?
• Is it typo-free, read aloud and by someone else?
• Is it two pages or fewer for most roles?
• Is it a clean single-column PDF that reads on a phone?
• Does the profile match this specific advert?

Fix those and you have already beaten most of the pile.