Dealing with Recruitment Agencies

Enygma

Sorry if this is a bit of a rant, there is a question tho.

Over the last few weeks and months I've been in touch with several Recruitment Agents who've been promising the moon and the starts and not delivering much. I kind of get the feeling I'm being given the run around a lot of the time.

One guy told me about this one job and said I was perfect for it and that he'd hand in my C.V. straight away. He said he'd be back to me in a day or two. A week or two later I emailed him for an update and he said that they were holding off hiring people until the new year. So first day back at work I email him just for a heads up, let him know I'm still interested, he tells me that the position has been filled.

Meanwhile I've had several other agents ringing me 3-4 times a day asking would I be interested in this or that. Then you get 2-3 weeks of silence.

One agent has even been passing me CVs of jobs she *knows* I can't do and asking me to ask around (i.e. do her job for her!)

I was wondering what the best way is to deal with them is:
Should I keep mailing them every few days for an update or do they get real pissed off at that?
Should I just let them off and do their thing?

Also when they tell you about the company that's hiring, couldn't you just apply directly? I guess it looks bad if they get two copies of your CV or something...

penexpers

Alot of companies that use agencies to recruit people won't recruit directly.

There's no good way of dealing with agencies. Hassling them every couple of days seems to be the way to go, im my (brief) experience.

Kobie

Yeah, they're all scum - no other way to put it. If you can go direct with a company then save yourself a load of hassle & do so. Otherwise they're just a necessary evil that you have to put up with.

Agents are out to look after themselves no.1 and the client company no.2. They don't give a toss about the candidates. The worst ones (UK agencies mostly, but some Irish ones) seem to take some sadistic pleasure in playing games and screwing you around as much as possible. It's incredible how few of them will even phone to tell you you didn't get the job - even if you've put up with all their crap and gone to an interview for them.

I even lost a job once because the agent had some sort of an argument with the client - nothing to do with me at all. Of course the agent never told me this - I found out from the client. Then there's the margins they take

Anyway, I could go on about them all night but I won't.....

HATE HATE HATE

jetsonx

I have heard lots of stories like that of the OP. Why do recruitment
agencies string people along like this ?

There was a discussion about online recruitment on this forum before and
one of the posters actually used to work as a programmer for a recruitment
website ( Irishjobs.ie or recruitireland.com) and admitted that some of the
jobs are actually fake or already taken. (seemingly freshly posted jobs
on a site do look well I suppose)

If anyone here does work in one of these "agencies" either a traditional one or online one could you elucidate what actually goes on in them ???

the_syco

I went to 5 recruitment agencies, got a few interviews (found out from one that the way I answered the questions wasn't the "right way"), but I eventually got a job, through a recruitment company. One question; what type of job are you looking for, and what type of qualifications do you have (relevent work experience[over 2 months], and certs, diploma's, etc.) and I may be able to tell you some good recruiters (good recruiter = recruiter who has gotten me interviews).

RicardoSmith

Enygma wrote:

...I was wondering what the best way is to deal with them is:
...

The least stressful way is just apply to the jobs each time as if they've never heard of you. Assume they've forgotten everything about you. Insist on a detailed job spec. If they don't have one then its baloney. Basically when a good match comes up, and they have your CV they'll ring you. Theres no point chasing them, either they have a job for you or they don't. If its real job then they will have details of the job. Anything thats too vague isn't a real job.

Chinafoot

fortunately i've only experienced one recruitment agency and it was when i was in Australia. not very pleasant. we were all promised "a minimum of six weeks work" and while myself and one of the other girls in our group got the six weeks, the other three got 3 weeks. it had nothing to do with the quality of their work....instead the recruitment agency had sent too many people for the job (according to the client company anyway)

similar thing happened with the same company and agency when we went back to Melbourne.....gave them a call to see if anything was available and they said "oh yes, we were planning to call you.....a similar position is available again...would you be interested?".....i was completely skint at this stage so was delighted. they said they'd call me later that day with the details. they didnt. so i rang them the next morning and was told someone would get back to me. thought maybe they just didnt want to hire me but it seemed a lot of people in the hostel were being treated this way. eventually got a straight answer that, basically, the client had decided to go with a different recruitment agency. cant say i blame them!
bastids! :mad:

Kobie

client had decided to go with a different recruitment agency

That happens a lot too. If a company is looking for a number of people they'll often take them all from the same agency, so even if you're perfect for the job but you've allowed the wrong agency to send in your CV, you're knackered. Quite often only one agency will have the contract anyway, but the others will get wind of it and start sending in CV's even though they haven'got a hope in hell.

Another thing that annoys me is the amount of companies that use agencies. Even small companies usually have a HR person - whose job it is to find staff, but they still call in the agencies to do their work for them.