I was approached by an internal recruiter to see if I had interest in this function. After a phone interview with the hiring manager I was invited to a face to face interview at the offices in Kerkrade, The Netherlands. The interview went really well and I was actually told that I was the best candidate so far. Unfortunately it all went down hill after that. I had to email the recruiter and hiring manager several times as they didn't get back to me themselves and was told I would be invited to a following round of interviews. After 3 months I was finally called and told that I was no longer a suitable candidate and that the preference had gone to internal applicants. OK, fair enough to have a preference for internal candidates but why didn't they think of that before approaching me! All in all a really strange experience.

Call with recruiter, they let me know that they had an internal candidate they wanted to hire and just had to look at external options. Declined to proceed with further interviews.