MEC-05 — Contact details in header/footer
Short answer
MEC-05 checks, field by field, whether email, phone, LinkedIn and GitHub sit inside the page header or footer band. The header is the top 6% of the page, the footer the bottom 6% — many ATS engines process those bands separately from the main flow and skip them.
Impact
12 pts
Penalty
mechanical · high
What it checks
- y coordinate of each contact field
- Whether the same field is repeated in the body
- Per-field flagging instead of a single "any contact found" check
Why it matters
Many ATS engines never scan header and footer flows, so the CV parses but the contact block stays empty. Most systems treat a record without an email as invalid — the recruiter cannot reach you even if they like the CV.
How to fix it
Move contact details out of the header/footer and into the normal document body at the top of page one.
Frequently asked questions
Is the whole CV rejected?
The CV still parses, but the contact fields come back empty and most systems invalidate a candidate record with no email.
Related rules
Guides That Cover This Rule
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