Just a Rant: Annoyed at Agency Who Lied About a Job

PasturesNew

Just got back from a day's temping. Supposed to be a 2-3 week booking, but 10 minutes after I got in there I realised that the agency had SERIOUSLY lied about the level of knowledge/expertise needed for the job.

They'd made out it was a simple admin job, but the client actually needs a specialised/experienced SQL developer. Now ... that's a massive difference.

I think they did it because they didn't understand the specialism, didn't ask the right questions of the client/or maybe didn't understand the answers the client gave ... and now I'm stuck in the middle. I know I am not "up to the job", so now need to flag this to the agency that it is highly likely that although I could get away with it today, I know that by the end of tomorrow my lack of knowledge/skill in what is a very specific requirement, my services will no longer be required. Which makes me mad as I figure the agency just wanted a bum on a seat ...

There's a slim possibility today's tasks were the highest level they will require for the booking, in which case I can "get away with it", but it's simply not right that the agency are skimping like this ... and paying half what the real skill-set's worth!

So ... thought I'd come here and rant before penning an email to my agency contact.

I thought I was in for a bit of easy MI report production, but it's fast and complex data mining of historical databases that aren't even connected and are in zips of zips on various drives across the network, in various different formats/layouts - and with a strict Govt set deadline attached (it's been forgotten/left by everybody else and now suddenly they want a temp in to do it) - in a version of software I've never seen, using features I've never touched and others I probably used once 15 years ago. If the agency had been clear/er I'd have said "Nope". I kind of said "nope" at the start, but she said it was just admin stuff so easy .... although I did have my first 'hint' when I saw the job title they put on the timesheet (that arrived over the weekend). The deadline for needing it was "today" ... and the permanent staff member was carted off by ambulance on Friday for stress. Says it all really.

T800

Why not keep trying - maybe you could learn the job as you go along?

PasturesNew

T800 wrote: »

Why not keep trying - maybe you could learn the job as you go along?

The client think they have a specialist 'expert' in this software. And there's nobody else there that knows it. You can't learn if you're up against high priority, unmovable deadlines, with no resources, no time - and you're expected to be "the expert" they just hired in.

PasturesNew

This is specialist and critical stuff, that would need advanced skills to be applied at the drop of a hat. Instantly.

I was lead to believe the job I'd be doing was akin to working with stuff already done and just minor tweaking of anything they have at the moment. What I am actually being expected to do is to produce everything from scratch, very quickly.

cazziebo

This is terrible - both for you and for the client company. Both of you have been compromised here.

There's a possibility it's a simple mistake, but this kind of mistake is borne out of incompetence. Any recruitment consultant would understand the difference between an office administrator, and an SQL administrator/developer.

There is also the possibility that it's a very naive way to get the bum on the seat, as you say. There is no way that this could go unnoticed in this sort of role - as it can do in more basic roles.

Whatever, it's intolerably bad service. I would copy the branch manager in to your complaint which should coolly and clearly explain your understanding of the job as relayed by the consultant, and the reality of what the client expected. If you get no joy, then I'd contact the area manager.

Good agencies take temp staff complaints very seriously indeed.

(as an ex-agency manager I cringe when I hear these sorts of stories. Good professional agencies will still make mistakes, everyone does, but will also do their best to rectify them)

Sorry you've had this experience.

FATBALLZ

You'd think the company would at least have a quick look over your CV instead of letting an agency full of high school dropouts drag anyone off the street without vetting them.

santacruz_2

I've been in a similar situation twice with recruitment agencies. I really don't like them!

I got sent to a 2 week admin job, what they did was make me THINK I could do it and made me think I had the relevant experience. Cut to me 2 weeks
later having been humiliated and put in horrible situations everyday pretending I could do a job I just couldn't do.

Then at a different agency I got put forward for a job I really really wanted and again was talked in to it, thinking I actually had a chance, so it cost me £36 to insure myself on a friends car because the job was in the middle of nowhere (but I'd be able to afford a car once I got the job!) only to get there and be humiliated again because I clearly wasn't what they were looking for, it was written all over their face! I still tried my hardest but yeah...didn't get it!

You have to be careful with recruitment agencies, some will send anyone anywhere in the vain hope they get employed and they get their cut.

PasturesNew

I've penned my "I quit" email. It was hard.... I've never encountered a job I couldn't do.... but, having said that, I've found in the past two years that agencies aren't the professional skills matching service that they used to be.

They do seem to have [a] riff raff off the streets, on the books to make up numbers a complete ignorance of IT skills (and the differences between them) -v- somebody who can use a PC to perform certain functions.

There's "being able to do this, once I know what you're after and I understand the data set and have a couple of hours to do a couple of data tests/trials to ensure I met the query requirements" and there's "being able to pull any query out of a hat on any system, instantly, without hesitation". I am definitely the first one. The agency usually place office bods at £6-7.50/hour, not IT specialists. She didn't even give me the job details etc, we spoke on Friday and it sounded like I'd probably get the job to maybe start Mon/Tue, then never heard another thing, until a random timesheet turned up on Saturday morning saying I was starting this morning. It was all a bit shabby ... and now it's all over. Phew!

T800

there mostly just interested in the massive bounty payments they get for matching up a worker to a client. Some of them are commonly in the region of 2k per employee.

PasturesNew

FATBALLZ wrote: »

You'd think the company would at least have a quick look over your CV instead of letting an agency full of high school dropouts drag anyone off the street without vetting them.

Just from today, it seems to me that most of them are part-time women, because they have kids ... and the permanent person who was to have done the job had forgotten it, then started doing it Friday afternoon, right before they collapsed at work and were carted off by ambulance and have now been deemed as having "stress". So I doubt they had time to make rational decisions. So I got the sharp end....

PasturesNew

T800 wrote: »

there mostly just interested in the massive bounty payments they get for matching up a worker to a client. Some of them are commonly in the region of 2k per employee.

Annualised, my rate was about £15k. I think they probably charge 50% more. It was for 2-3 weeks.... probably.