At what stage of the recruitment process would you telephone a candidate rather than email them?

Isn't that what everyone does? At least once you have a candidate who has responded to an advert.

Surprisingly, no!

Sorry a bit sarcastic there but in my experiences it's very rare to get any response to an application.  I've got Plans B, C & D in place and recent encounters with the recruitment process, through websites or the employer direct, have shown that companies often can't be bothered to respond.  Others post "if you haven't heard from us in x days, your application has been unsuccessful".  At least you know where you are.

Not to mention the poor e-mail responses.  I recently applied to a local private hospital.  When they finally told me I hadn't got an interview, the e-mail was shocking.  No subject, no greeting, role title hadn't been inserted into text (just a gap between brackets) and no signature block at the end.  I flirted with replying they needed me to improve their admin standards, but I couldn't be bothered.  Then there's the HR person who calls after reading your CV, proceeds to read their job description then starts asking you questions but obviously doesn't know what you are talking about.

The recruitment process, especially online, is discussed at great length on LinkedIn.  I was sceptical about the reports being true, but it seems the UK is just as bad as the US.   When recruiters report back to applicants they get a wide variety of reactions.  One applicant to a UK company, when told he had been unsuccessful, responded "screw you".  Nice!!

Blimey, I stand corrected 

Maybe it's big business mentality, plus if you are dealing with hundreds/thousands of applicants I suppose email/online is naturally more efficient albeit less personal. 

I want to talk to all of our applicants as it's the first stage of filtering, but we have the luxury of being small enough to be able to keep it personal.