Key Takeaways

  • 75% of U.S. employers use automated applicant tracking systems to screen resumes before a human reviews them (Harvard Business School & Accenture, 2021)
  • The most common ATS failures are missing keywords, incompatible formatting, and incorrect file types
  • ResumeGeni scores your resume across 8 parsing layers — modeled on the same steps enterprise ATS platforms like Workday, Greenhouse, and Taleo use to evaluate candidates

How ATS Resume Scoring Works

Applicant tracking systems parse your resume into structured data — extracting your name, contact info, work history, skills, and education — then score how well that data matches the job requirements. Many ATS rejections happen because the parser couldn't extract critical fields, not because the candidate wasn't qualified.

LayerWhat It ChecksWhy It Matters
Document extractionFile format, encoding, readabilityCorrupted or image-only PDFs fail immediately
Layout analysisTables, columns, headers, footersMulti-column layouts break field extraction
Section detectionExperience, education, skills headingsNon-standard headings cause sections to be missed
Field mappingName, email, phone, dates, titlesMissing contact info is a common cause of immediate rejection
Keyword matchingJob-specific terms, skills, certificationsKeyword overlap affects recruiter search visibility and ATS scoring
Chronology checkDate ordering, gap detectionReverse-chronological order is expected by most ATS
QuantificationMetrics, numbers, measurable outcomesQuantified achievements help human reviewers and some scoring models
Confidence scoringOverall parse quality and completenessLow-confidence parses get deprioritized in results

Frequently Asked Questions

Is ResumeGeni free?
Yes. ResumeGeni is currently in beta — ATS analysis, scoring, and initial improvement suggestions are free with no signup required. Full guidance and saved reports may require a free account.
What file formats are supported?
PDF, DOCX, DOC, TXT, RTF, ODT, and Apple Pages. PDF and DOCX are recommended for best ATS compatibility.
How is the ATS score calculated?
Your resume is processed through an 8-layer parsing pipeline that extracts structured data the same way enterprise ATS platforms do. The score reflects how completely and accurately your resume can be parsed, plus how well your content matches common ATS ranking criteria.
Can ATS read PDF resumes?
Yes, but not all PDFs are equal. Text-based PDFs parse well. Image-only PDFs (scanned documents) and PDFs with complex tables or multi-column layouts often fail ATS parsing. Our analyzer will flag these issues.
How do I improve my ATS score?
Focus on three areas: use a clean single-column format, include keywords from the job description naturally in your experience bullets, and ensure all sections (contact, experience, education, skills) use standard headings.

ATS Guides & Resources

Built by engineers with 12 years of experience building enterprise hiring technology at ZipRecruiter. Last updated .

Senior Backend Engineer

Dice FM · Remote

United Kingdom Indefinite (FT) DICE 2026-01-30

Senior Backend Engineer - Remote, UK Timezone (within +/- 2 hours)

Live shows make us feel good. They’re a time to hang with our friends, discover new artists or lose ourselves on a dancefloor. We’re on a mission to bring all of this to more fans, more often – and that’s where you come in.

We’re looking for a Senior Backend Engineer to join our Product team and drive exceptional product developments for fans, venues and artists.

At DICE, you’ll be part of the company that’s redefining live entertainment. It’s a place where you can be yourself, influence the culture, and create work that you’re proud of. 

About the role

DICE is scaling fast and we’ve got ambitious goals for our platforms. As a Senior Backend Engineer, you will play a pivotal role in architectural decisions, helping define not just what we build, but how it scales.

Our backend apps are written mostly in Elixir. They feed various information to our award-winning apps with GraphQL and REST API, and handle millions of transactions for our ticket sales. Our code is hosted in GitHub, pipelines are managed by Drone CI, and we deploy to Kubernetes clusters.

We are always open to making changes and improvements to our workflow and codebase, and we will look to you to champion these improvements for the benefit of the team and the product.

You’ll be

  • Architecting and developing complex, high-load backend systems written in Elixir.

  • Leading technical discussions with Product Managers, Engineers, and Designers to turn vague requirements into robust technical specifications.

  • Mentoring mid-level and junior engineers, conducting code reviews, and fostering a culture of technical excellence.

  • Proactively identifying bottlenecks in our ticketing and event management systems and designing scalable solutions to handle traffic spikes.

  • Championing best practices in testing, documentation, and maintainability across the engineering organisation.

You are

  • A technical leader who enjoys sharing knowledge and uplifting the team.
  • Passionate, humble and talented.

  • A fan of music and culture.
  • Actively responsible and ownership-driven; you don't just write code, you own the outcome in production.

  • Pragmatic about technical debt versus feature delivery.
  • Eager to build apps that make a positive impact on the world.

  • A great communicator.

You’ll need

  • Extensive production experience with Elixir, OTP, and Phoenix (or deep expertise in another functional language with a willingness to master Elixir quickly).

  • A strong track record of designing and developing distributed systems at scale.

  • Experience integrating complex third-party services and gracefully handling failure scenarios.

  • Deep understanding of database internals (PostgreSQL/Redis) and query performance optimisation.

  • Deep understanding of how OSes and Linux work internally.

  • Experience mentoring other engineers and influencing technical decisions within a team.

About DICE

DICE is based throughout Europe, North America, Australia and India, and is rapidly growing worldwide. We’re constantly innovating to bring amazing products to fans, artists, venues and promoters.

We know that having a variety of perspectives makes us a better company – it's why we strongly encourage members of underrepresented communities to apply. Find out how we're creating a more diverse, equitable and inclusive DICE.

Application process

Our process usually involves a quick chat on the phone, a portfolio review or task and a couple of interviews where you’ll meet the people you’ll work with. We’ll keep you fully informed along the way.

For information on how we use your data, please view our Candidate Privacy Policy.