Can I be sued by a recruitment agency?

bluecheese1987

Hi there and thank you for looking at my post.

Can you be sued for not taking a job without signing an employment contract?

So here is the situation.

About 6 months ago I was offered a decent job with a major international company through a recruitment agency. I.E. the recruiter advertised and set up the interview etc for me.

I was sucessful and was offered the job. The position went to referencing and then unfortunately something happened to one of my parents and I had to return to the family home as I honestly thought we were talking about end of life care at this stage. My head was all over the place.

I told the recruiter my situation and that I would be incommunicado. He tried to contact me but given the circumstances I ignored his calls prefering to get my head around what was going on. As you can imagine I was all over the place and in no fit state to be thinking about anything other than what was going on with my parent.

About a month later I get a call from the recruiter who says that the company has now filled the job that I went for. OK, however they had another role that I could be good for. So I say ok and as things were looking better with my parent I said that I would talk to them about it. Unfortunately, things took a turn for the worse and I missed the telephone interview and had to return home.

So, fast forward 4 months during which time I heard nothing from the recruiters at all. In assumed that they had filled the job and were not contacting me again- we all know what recruiters are like in that regard. As time went on this episode passed my mind and I moved on and took a job very recently with a friend.

About 20 minutes ago, and out of the blue, the recruiter rings up and he is furious. He demands an appology, calls me unprofessional, demands that I come to London to make a face to face appology and then starts asking if I have a partner and how they would feel if I treated them like I had him! He also said that he is a big fish in the recruitment world and that he has many contacts in my area. I asked him if he was threatening me and he of course said not. I assumed that he was saying this to scare me and ruin my name. Throughout the 45 minute call, I appologised that I had not been in contact and explained that my situation meant that I was not thinking straight at the time and tha it was not personal- rather I dropped everything and put my efforts into my family- we only have two parents right.

So the call went like this- You need to come and appologise to my face. I said, no. I am sorry and your right the fact that I didnt contact you was not great but given the circumstances I feel that you can understand why I did what I did. You are unprofessional and should explain yourself to me and my colleagues at our office. I say NO- but I am sorry about the situation.

Now repeat this about 5 times before I get angry. I tell him that I am highly intimidated by this call, I feel that he is threatening me and that although I have appologised he will not let it go. I point out that I DID NOT SIGN A CONTRACT and asked why he left it so long to contact me. The man then asked me what injuries my parent suffered- its true he really did. And demanded proof.

At this point I threatened to call the police and told him that I was recording the call. I asked to speak to his manager and again told him that he was behaving unprofessionally. Surely he should just accept that the situation went bad for me and I wasnt about to take the job.

Before he hung up he said something that I want to query here. He said: "I'm going to consult our legal team about this because wht you did was awful".....

Can I be sued for not taking the job?

I didnt sign anything.

I was going through referencing but this was not completed.

Please help me? I want to complain about the behaviour of this man but I am quite scared by his last comment. What should I do?

Thank you for any help you can offer.

agrinnall

Bluster from an ignorant fool. If he really does consult a legal person they will hopefully tell him that he's an idiot in robust language. If you want to take it further you could complain to a senior person in his agency, or if the agency is a member of a trade association, complain to them. Or just make sure that if his number comes up when he calls that you either ignore it or pick up and put down the phone without speaking to him.

Majestic12

This is appauling behaviour. Is he a one man band agency or part of a company?

bluecheese1987

Hi there,

He is part of an agency so I would expect him to behave in a more professional manner....boy I was wrong.

Free_Spirit_31

He is probably upset that he has not earned his commission.

Annisele

So in brief, he wants to "take legal advice" because you missed a telephone interview?

Regardless of your reasons for missing it, that's just plain daft. Like agrinnal, I would expect any legal team to give him the legal version of "you idiot". I suspect the bluster was just to worry you, to make it less likely that you'd complain about him.

A 45 minute call from a recruiter does sound pretty strange. I wonder if he's been fired himself - usually recruiters don't want to waste such a long time speaking to somebody who isn't going to produce a commission for them!

Justicia

bluecheese1987 wrote: »

Throughout the 45 minute call,

You let that call go on for about 42 minutes too long.

He calls, unhappy. You apologise. He doesn't accept your apology. Nothing more to be done, so call ended by you. Life goes on.

TrickyDicky101

In every dealing I've had with recruiters (where I have been seeking a job) the recruiter works for the employer not the candidate so if this was the case you have no legal relationship with this agency at all. Much the same way in that an estate agent usually works for the vendor and not the buyer when purchasing a house.

pmduk

Don't worry about being sued. He, and his employers, wouldn't let his unprofessional behaviour get aired in a court.

prowla

Utter baloney; an offer of employment can be withdrawn up to the day it is started, and likewise the candidate can change their mind.

From the legal side, the recruiter would get laughed at for wanting to sue someone for missing a phone interview.

The recruiter went OTT in haranguing the OP, but I would expect them to possibly not deal with them again on the basis of two let-downs (regardless of circumatances).

BritishBibliophile

If people could be sued for not taking a job arranged by a recruiter then no one would ever use them. Lots of people end up declining a job offer, whether it's personal circumstances such as what you were going for, or the offer simply didn't renumerate them as much as they were expecting.

If you want to put in a complaint, and frankly I would, I think you should do it in writing. If you call them then for all you know the receptionist will either put you through to the same person, or will just screen the calls as the manager will be busy. Make sure you include the date and time you received the call so he can't just bluster his way out of it. Address it to the Head of Recruitment, there might be something on their website about who that is so you can get an actual name, and then send it off. You might get an apology, you might get nothing, but at least you've made them aware of the situation.

At the bottom of your letter you could also tell them that they MUST remove your information from their systems, not only do you not want this man contacting you again but you also have no intention of going through their agency for roles in the future.