Recruitment Agencies – A bit Tricky

Get the upper hand with a job recruitment agency

Job hunters will often turn to recruitment agencies to help secure employment and why not, recruitment agencies will search for vacancies on your behalf, give advice on your CV and facilitate between you and the employer, your start date.

There are many good agencies you should sign up to and many agencies that give the recruitment agency sector a bad name and should be avoided, below are some of the reasons why.

Tricks Recruitment Agencies:

Advertise False Vacancies

This is a well-known recruitment trick, by advertising false vacancies, job seekers will register with the agency, and this allows the agency to boast to employers about the high level of potential employees and CVs they have on their database.

Asking for References

The agency will ask for a reference for the “false” vacancy. Remember there is no job, the agency is looking to gain new employer contact details.

Gaining Contact Details

When you supply the agency with the company name you previously worked for, they will ask “who was your line manager, was it Mr “False Name” and the common response is “No, it was Mr “Real Name” The agency now have a new contact for a new business that they will approach.

Finding Employers

Recruitment agencies need to find companies that are recruiting, they will offer the recruitment service and make money by charging a percentage off the employee’s wage. Agencies will often ask you to tell them which companies you have applied to; they now have new companies to contact. Once these companies’ sign up to the recruitment service you will quickly have double the competition for the position, that until you told the recruitment agency they didn’t know about.

The Perfect Job

The phone rings and the agency tell you “I have the perfect job for you but you need to start immediately!” If your working you may be advised to take this perfect job (remember when you take a job the agency gain a percentage of your wage, the more people who take jobs the more money they earn) even when you are employed, they may even tell that this job is so good you should walk out of your present job – burning your bridges and chances of a good reference.

Wage Decrease

Once you are offered a job, you may be told they were not able to secure the rate that you wanted. This is rubbish as they have already had discussions with the company regarding the rate of pay.

They may also tell you “there aren’t many of these jobs about I would take it if I was you” only take the job if you are happy with the wage, the recruitment agency wants you to take the job so they can earn more money, they are not interested in you as a person.

Time is Money

If you fail one or two interviews, the agency will tell you that they will keep looking for work for you, they won’t they will just drop you. They don’t want to spend time looking for work for someone who can’t pass interviews. Really they should give you interview advice to help you pass future job interviews, but they feel …time is money.

Introduction Fee

We all get excited at a prospect of a £500 introduction fee, recruitment agencies will offer you this fee if you introduce them to an employer which leads to a job. You will only receive this payment if you find out about the job and after you continue to ask for your fee.

Like we said at the beginning not all recruitment agencies are like this, just be aware and look for these tell tale signs.