ATS Systems Explained — How to Get Your CV Past the Robots

What Is an ATS?

An Applicant Tracking System (ATS) is software used by employers to collect, filter, and rank job applications. When you upload your CV to a company careers page or a job board like Reed, Totaljobs, or Indeed, it almost certainly passes through an ATS before a human ever sees it. According to various estimates, over 75% of UK employers with more than 100 employees use some form of ATS — and for graduate schemes and large public sector employers, that figure approaches 100%.

How Does ATS Parsing Work?

When your CV is uploaded, the ATS "parses" it — it extracts text, identifies sections (contact details, work experience, education), and stores this information in structured fields in a database. It then scores or filters candidates based on keywords matched against the job description. Candidates below a certain threshold may never reach a human reviewer.

The key word here is "parses." ATS systems are extracting raw text. They are largely blind to formatting. A beautifully designed CV with columns, icons, and embedded fonts looks like garbled nonsense to most ATS parsers.

What Breaks ATS Systems?

• Tables and columns — text inside Word table cells is often read in the wrong order or skipped entirely
• Text boxes — text in text boxes is frequently ignored completely
• Headers and footers — these are outside the main document body and most parsers don't read them
• Icons and images — any text embedded within an image (such as a skills bar chart) is invisible to ATS
• Non-standard fonts — system-unavailable fonts can cause character encoding errors
• Uncommon file types — always use PDF or Word (.docx). Never send .pages, .odt, or other formats
• Colourful section headings — some parsers misidentify coloured text as not being regular content

The Keyword Problem

ATS systems match keywords in your CV against keywords in the job description. If the job description says "stakeholder management" and your CV says "working with stakeholders," some ATS systems will not make that connection. Exact phrase matching is common. This is why mirroring the language of the job description matters so much.

Identify the five to ten most important skills and phrases in the job description. Make sure they appear in your CV — naturally, not stuffed. Don't hide white-text keywords on a white background — modern ATS systems detect this and it will get your application rejected instantly.

How to Optimise Your CV for ATS

1. Use a clean, single-column layout for any ATS submission. If you have a beautifully formatted PDF you use for direct email applications, keep a simpler version for online job board submissions.
2. Use standard section headings — "Work Experience," "Education," "Skills." Creative headings like "Where I've Been" confuse parsers.
3. Include keywords from the job description — in your profile, in your bullet points, and in your skills section.
4. Spell out abbreviations — "Search Engine Optimisation (SEO)" is safer than just "SEO" on the first mention.
5. Use a .docx or PDF — check the application instructions. If it says DOCX, use DOCX. If it says PDF, use PDF. If it doesn't say, PDF is usually safer.

Does ATS Mean Your CV Will Never Be Read?

No. ATS filters, it doesn't replace human review. The goal is to get past the initial filter so that a recruiter or hiring manager does read it. Once you're in front of a human, all the normal CV advice applies — strong bullets, tailored profile, clear structure, no typos.

Some smaller employers and agencies still read CVs manually without any ATS. But you cannot know which employers use which systems, so it's safest to optimise for both humans and machines.

Testing Your CV Against ATS

A simple test: copy and paste your CV into a plain text editor (Notepad on Windows, TextEdit in plain text mode on Mac). Everything you can read is what most ATS systems can read. Everything that disappeared — icons, images, formatted tables — is invisible. If the result is a garbled mess, your formatting is too complex.

Several free tools online (Jobscan, Resume Worded) can analyse your CV against a specific job description and score your keyword match. These are worth using for competitive applications.

The Bottom Line

ATS is not something to fear — it's something to understand and design around. A well-structured, keyword-optimised, cleanly formatted CV will sail through ATS filters. The extra 20 minutes you spend tailoring your CV to each job description is the highest-return investment you can make in your job search.