Do agencies really help people to find work?

dmliverpool

Just a quick question. Through my experience I have always gained meaningful employment on my own back. I sourced, applied, and secured many great jobs including my current one.

I have done brief short term temp jobs and the experience was terrible. They just seem to pimp People and cream money off the top or more shocking is the employers that use them as they know the practices they adopt when sourcing workers? The part I dont like is when they use about 50 people to do 95% of the assignments they advertise online on the off chance there is a gem out there that they can exploit for even more money.

My question is, can meaningful career focussed work be found through an agency, really?

Isn't it exploitation not telling a temp working for an agency on an assignment what the agency is earning per hour? As there is no way a temp can ask for a say rise?

anamenottaken

dmliverpool wrote: »

J
Isn't it exploitation not telling a temp working for an agency on an assignment what the agency is earning per hour? As there is no way a temp can ask for a say rise?

What do you mean by "earning"? If you mean "charging", then that is only useful if the temp worker also considers what would be paid in holiday pay, employers' NI, VDU sight tests, etc.

dmliverpool

Well yes charging, as all these things would be included in the salary or conditions with regards to the temp being directly employed by the assignment company. As a directly employed employee you would normally be privy to such detail before starting. With temps is this gap exploited.

Emmzi

I don't hand my staff a list of overheads I have paid every month. Why would an agency?

And actually you can ask an agency for a pay rise. There is no law against it. You just have to be so good at what you do that you are worth it.

liney

Is it expolitation that Asda don't tell me how much they paid for the bottle of wine they sold me? Even then I would need to know how much distribution, storage, retail space, staffing etc cost them in order to work out their actual profit. It is not simply charge 12.00 pay 7 = £5.00 profit.

An agency is a business model and it there to make money first and foremost. It is coincidence that the money is made by placing people in work. It is not the labour exchange.

anamenottaken

dmliverpool wrote: »

Well yes charging, as all these things would be included in the salary or conditions with regards to the temp being directly employed by the assignment company. As a directly employed employee you would normally be privy to such detail before starting. With temps is this gap exploited.

As an employee I don't really think about how much it is costing my employer in terms of NI, sight tests, potential sick pay. The gross profit of the agency on pay is not the concern of the worker as long as they are being paid fairly for the work they do. Exploitation would arise if the worker does not receive a fair day's pay.

Hammyman

dmliverpool wrote: »

Well yes charging, as all these things would be included in the salary or conditions with regards to the temp being directly employed by the assignment company. As a directly employed employee you would normally be privy to such detail before starting. With temps is this gap exploited.

What the hell are you on about? Why should an employee be privy to how much profit the company is making from their labour? It is none of their business. There is no exploitation. You work for the agency and they charge your labour out to their customer at £x. This is no different from a cleaner working for a cleaning company at one of their clients or the guy in your computer shop who gets paid £x an hour and you're billed at £y per hour.

If you don't like it, set up as self employed and find your own clients.