Recruitment Agencies (Are they worth signing up for ?)

Mini_Bear

I work in the city and have always used agencies in my line of work - i put my cv on monster and they contact me. however in my hometown (essex market town) the agencies are appauling - my brother is desperate to work and the agencies have actually locked their doors - they just say post cv through letter box and we will get bak to you. Agents have told my brother (at job fairs) they have a lot of very disgruntled and desperate people and its a safety measure for their staff!! i find it really depressing and shocking.

olly300

gus1 wrote: »

In this area one job was advertised on the companies web site and yet six agencies were also advertising the same position. Had I waited a while I could have applied via agency advertising rather than spend two hours completing the on line application and groan the dreaded written statement!
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Sometimes agencies copy job adverts from a company's website and post them up as their own.

Then when they think they have found suitable candidates they can call up the company, and try and speak directly to the person doing the hiring in an attempt to get commission.

If they do manage to speak to the actual manager who needs the staff they don't take no for an answer and will often ring up 4 times in a day.

Therefore one trick I do is if I work for a company that doesn't use agencies, I ensure my reference comes from the HR department. My manager at the company may write the reference but I don't give any agency that manager's name.

wontfallforit

Stylehutz wrote: »

Does anyone else out there have problems when registering with Recruitment Agencies ? I was made redundant 5 months ago and registered with about a dozen or so around my area looking for temporary work while I am looking for permanent work. I am now beginning to wish that I should not have bothered.

I contact them every other day but most of the time either get an aggressive response saying no work at the moment or the consultants fail to get back to me by not returning my calls.

Another thing I find, is that if I see a job advertised with the agency, they just seem to say that the position has gone or it is on hold. I am beginning to wonder that they are just advertising made up jobs for the sake of it in an effort to get people register with the agency.

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I've had good and bad experiences with agencies, having enrolled with two in the past. In both cases, they contacted me, rather than vice versa, which set alarm bells ringing in the first place.

The first time was when I was about to graduate. An agency contacted me out of the blue in regards to my CV being posted on monster. My CV was awful! I know it now, but I didn't realise it then. I'd always worked since I was 16, but generally part-time and in shops. So when they contacted me and started to send me on wild goose chases for interviews for temporary jobs that I clearly wasn't suitable for, I ceased all contact with them.

One particular interview was memorable. It wasn't the fault of the agency, but rather the company. It was a 6 month temp position in the postroom of a very large company. I showed up for interview, was given a 30-second tour of the site (in complete silence!) and was shown the door. The agency contacted me within seconds of leaving the building, saying that Massive Company Ltd. didn't want to offer me the job because I wasn't forthright enough and didn't ask enough questions...

Fair enough, I've taken that advice on board and have succeeded ever since, but, the person who showed me around did so in complete silence, like I said! They didn't ask me a single question, so where was I to take that? It was a menial temp job, and I was an inexperienced 20 year old, I wasn't prepared for what seemed like a psychometric test!

Anyway, the agency contacted me again with a few wildly inappropriate roles, and I didn't bother going to any of the interviews they'd set up for me after that. When they said that a manager of a brewery was "very interested" in my CV and would like to interview me with a view to becoming his PA, I ceased all contact with the agency there and then. There was no way on earth I was going to get that job, and the manager of the brewery in question probably wasn't even aware that I was a) so young, b) so inexperienced and c) had never even considered being a PA, ever.

So that was that.

My second experience with an agency was much more positive, and landed me my current job. The agency-employer dialogue seemed seamless, and the agency really helped me in getting things just right for my various interview stages with my current job. As soon as I landed the job, the agency stepped out of the picture, and I was immediately on the payroll of the company, rather than on some agency wage. During the recruitment process, their contact with me was fantastic (and I was not hassled), and there was always a friendly voice at the end of the phone. Additionally, just one member of staff dealt with myself, which made the whole experience a bit more personal, and not as clinical as in my first agency experience.

The second agency were prepared to advise me on one job at a time, and only considered roles that were suitable for me, my skills and experience. As it happens, I got the first job they proposed, but there were plenty more up for grabs. The first agency blindly threw me into any old interviews for ridiculous jobs. Thinking about it, they were almost certainly chasing commission/inecntives by using the "dartboard" approach - throwing everyone forward for every role imaginable

Chinkle

Just like estate agencies, dating agencies and various other middle-men they have become a necessary evil.

Because there's always an imbalance of jobs/employees they will always find a way to make money from pairing the two. In good times they practically fall over you to sell you a "dream job". Right now they are swamped with potential employees and have no where near enough clients with vacancies. Yes, some will try to pinch business from companies wanting to advertise directly and don't actually have that business on their books. However, companies are also using them to sift through literally hundreds if not thousands of applicants for every job that comes up, so they will only put a few of the best CV's forward each time.

There is some merit in calling them to remind them you're still available, interested, keen etc but remember you're competing with many, many other individuals in the same boat so just getting through to an agency to speak to someone is an achievement in itself.

RJP33

The fake job advertising used to be a technique in better times to get as many CVs on the books as possible, so RCs can match candidates with other jobs and have a much quicker turnaround.

loisa

Three years ago, fresh out of uni I practically fell into a temp job with very little previous experience. I didn't even have a decent reference- I had to rely on my university documents to prove what I had been doing! I don't think I realised how lucky I was at the time!

Now I have two years admin experience, voluntary work experience, I'm half way through a word processing course and I'm far more confident than I was back then. I've got absolutely nowhere with agencies this time around, they don't want to know.

I had almost given up on agencies but recently I went to see a careers adviser who reckoned that agencies still had a 70-80% share of admin work in my city. I've no idea how accurate this figure is but it does seem that some agencies are doing better than others.

I was given a huge list of agencies, most of which I had never heard of and told basically to email every single one of them every week if neccessary. I was also given the tip of putting a catchy title is the email such as : "administrator with 2 years experience, willing to temp". rather than "application" or "CV". Eventually it will land on the right persons desk with a bit of luck...

wontfallforit

loisa wrote: »

Three years ago, fresh out of uni I practically fell into a temp job with very little previous experience. I didn't even have a decent reference- I had to rely on my university documents to prove what I had been doing! I don't think I realised how lucky I was at the time!

Now I have two years admin experience, voluntary work experience, I'm half way through a word processing course and I'm far more confident than I was back then. I've got absolutely nowhere with agencies this time around, they don't want to know.

I had almost given up on agencies but recently I went to see a careers adviser who reckoned that agencies still had a 70-80% share of admin work in my city. I've no idea how accurate this figure is but it does seem that some agencies are doing better than others.

I was given a huge list of agencies, most of which I had never heard of and told basically to email every single one of them every week if neccessary. I was also given the tip of putting a catchy title is the email such as : "administrator with 2 years experience, willing to temp". rather than "application" or "CV". Eventually it will land on the right persons desk with a bit of luck...

They do seem to dominate the temp admin/office field, so perhaps there's some truth in that figure. They also have their fingers in the call-centre work pie.

A local agency (that I've never used) used to have lots of factory/production line work, and used to have a lot of success in placing primarily young people on pretty long temp. contracts. My ex was very lucky in that he was looking for literally a few days' work one summer 5 years ago, for a few extra quid at best, and ended up earning about £250 (net) per week for 14 weeks solid. Had he not gone back to uni for his final year, he could've stayed on a lot longer.

That seems to have dried up a lot, given what's gone on in manufacturing, etc.

The office-y type of roles still seem to come thick and fast (though a few people have mentioned fake job adverts, which could also play a part).

donnajunkie

dave4545454 wrote: »

exactly

agencies should be made illegal

i agree but they never will for two reasons.

1. all of the people who work for them would add to the dole queue.

2. it would annoy big business who like them because it allows them to treat workers like rubbish.

actually theres another,

3. local authorities can save money by having agency workers for the minimum wage instead of paying them the proper wage and of course they can treat them like rubbish.

i used to register with agencies and alot would reply and often write to me a year later asking me to update them. i dont think they ever contacted me about a job though. about 5 years ago i went for a job at a local big company. the recruitment was done by an agency. the ad gave the impression it was rotating shifts. i was up for that but i didnt want to do permanent nights. when i called she asked if i can work nights i said yes but she didnt say it was just for nights. when i went to see her i discovered it was for nights only. i said but the ad says it is for all shifts. i said i didnt want to do permanent nights. she wasnt happy but said she would still consider me for the future. i actually believed her at that point because she didnt need to say that. she then contacted my advisor and slagged me off and said i had no chance of getting a job there now.
in my area agencies are generally unpopular. they can be good in certain industries. for example in the chemical industry you get the same terms and conditions as the proper workers.

CCFC_80

donnajunkie wrote: »

i agree but they never will for two reasons.

1. all of the people who work for them would add to the dole queue.

2. it would annoy big business who like them because it allows them to treat workers like rubbish.

actually theres another,

3. local authorities can save money by having agency workers for the minimum wage instead of paying the people wage and of couse can treat them like rubbish.

i used to register with agencies and alot would reply and often write to me a year later asking me to update them. i dont think they ever contacted me about a job though. about 5 years ago i went for a job at a local big company. the recruitment was done by an agency. the ad gave the impression it was rotating shifts. i was up for that but i didnt want to do permanent nights. when i called she asked if i can work nights i said yes but she didnt say it was just for nights. when i went to see her i discovered it was for nights only. i said but the ad says it is for all shifts. i said i didnt want to do permanent nights. she wasnt happy but said she would still consider me for the future. i actually believed her at that point because she didnt need to say that. she then contacted my advisor and slagged me off and said i had no chance of getting a job there now.
in my area agencies are generally unpopular. they can be good in certain industries. for example in the chemical industry you get the same terms and conditions as the proper workers.

I do agree with you about banning agencies but think that you miss the point on issue number 3 as the employers are probably paying out more money on the whole to the agencies even when they are paying them minimum rate. They could easily pass that on to the worker by taking them on direct.

I would like to see agencies banned because then all employers would have to recruit by other means and that would mean that I would personally have more chance of finding employment going direct to the employer then the nightmare and unneccessarily hard work of dealing with the agency.

piggeh

olly300 wrote: »

Sometimes agencies copy job adverts from a company's website and post them up as their own.

Happened to me yesterday - the company had not given the job details to any agencies to advertise but it was listed several times on reed website and with a higher salary than the role actually paid. It was very annoying as I went in expecting the salary advertised on the reed website only to find out in actual fact it was a lot lower.