Naming and shaming, disgraceful recruitment agencies

I've started to build a list of the worst recruitment agencies I've encountered in recent times and now it's time to name and shame.

Rather than just slag them off, I'll give my reasons so, if any of them want to have a go at defending themselves, the can raise cudgels with me.

Trinity Personnel, Amblecote, Stourbridge.

I'd applied for a job for which I was well suited. Received a phone call saying I'd an interview that coming Friday, but I had to go to their offices and register first.

A little inconvenient as I'd not got a car back then. I took two buses to get there which took two and a half hours.

I filled out lots of forms and was invited into an office only to hear "the interview has been postponed".

The employer had "suddenly got busy" (her words) and weren't taking anyone on that side of Christmas (this was October).

This was also news they could have broken to me over the phone before I wasted a morning of my time travelling by bus to their office to fill out forms.

Oddly, I didn't really buy the story and lo and behold, the next week, the same job was advertised in the press and at least twice more before the year end.

I never heard from Trinity Personnel again and as you might imagine, as I'm prepared to name and shame them, would never use them again.

Verdict: Wastrels and time wasters.

Niyaa People.

I applied for a job online and received a Dear John all within thirty seconds.

I politely challenged them by e mail that they'd not had time to read my cover letter let alone the cv .

They said I'd not got the background for the job.

I wouldn't apply for a painting and decorating job. I am rubbish at it and I don;t do ladders very well. I'd read the description and therefore applied based on the description.

I am capable of reading a job spec and balancing whether it suits of not. This did or I wouldn't have applied.

The thirty second response time was frankly a joke. I responded by telling them I would make sure I never applied via their outfit again and I repeat that now.

Verdict: Truly unprofessional

Searchability

I rekindled my Linkedin profile unsure of whether I was doing the right thing, as Linkedin have a habit of sending you fake contact requests.

I received a message, a phone call, an e mail from some guy called Liam. When he called me, I was at work and up to my ears finishing projects. I told him I'd drop him a detailed e mail as to what I was looking for by weekend.

"Can't we speak tomorrow" he pleaded.

I sent him the agreed information and included the fact I'm a mature applicant.

I Never heard from Liam again.

Discussing this with my work colleague, she told me he'd been pestering here too, by phone, text, e mail and Whats app.

Verdict: Scatter gun jackals.

Talking of my colleague, she applied for a job and received a response from an agency. the woman was dead keen (aren't they all at that stage). Arranged an interview with the employer for Thursday afternoon, with the proviso, that she interviewed my colleague first.

Meeting arranged for Monday at the local Costa for 5:15. Colleague arranges a half day holiday so she doesn't have to fake a dental appointment or whatever.

On the Monday woman cancels the Costa interview and says Thursday is cancelled too. Colleague writes to her and asks cancelled or postponed ?

Didn't get a reply. See, no longer a valued client or opportunity to earn a quick buck, whole method of dealing with a person changes for the worse.

I don;t have the agency name to shame with, but

verdict, typical.

As these things don't occur every day, I will post this now with certainly an addendum. Watch this space.

Added April 20th.

This one involves a friend. She applied for a job in Telford, was contacted by some guy from an agency. Boy did he care about her future employment ?

He told her all about the lovely offices where she'd be located, the small friendly team. The opportunity to work remotely after her probationary period.

She attended the interview, it wasn't with the person she'd been told it would be with, but no matter. The job wasn't in Telford but in the jewellery quarter in Birmingham about thirty miles away.

It wasn't with a small friendly team in lovely offices, but a huge building. In fact, the job wasn't much like it had been described at all.

Something these nobber recruitment types really should learn, is that setting up interviews in working hours means that candidates either have to use valuable holiday or invent an appointment to allow them to be missing from their daytime paid post.

No one goes into a job interview with the intention of not getting it and taking into account the lottery element because there can always be someone on the list more experienced and suited to the post than you, you still are there to achieve a result.

To come out feeling you've wasted your time, let alone holiday or a credibility point with that fake dental appointment, is the most soul destroying feeling.

Nipper at the agency lost nothing with his stories. He put forward three candidates and so has three opportunities to earn a wedge from the employer if any one from the three gets the job.

I'm not sure of the name of this agency, but they are categorised with a high percentage of recruitment outfits.

told you didn't I ?

Professional time wasters.

Fact finding or time wasting, you pin the tail on the donkey.

Colleague gets phone call from a agency asking all kinds of questions such as why do you want to move from you present job ? If you're an employer this is possibly a fair question I guess, but not an agency, especially as this idiot on the phone hadn't even got a post in mind. She was just fishing, "What are your salary expectations".

Well, isn't the honest answer something along the lines of "Well I need enough to pay the bills and keep the car running so I can get to the job, or indeed "As much as I can get for doing the lest amount of work".

After all capitalism is based on paying as little for the most of whatever you're parting with money for. Isn't it a two way street.

Personally, I reckon where recruitment agencies are concerned, they have slow days too and that's when they make phone calls like the one described. Nothing to do with fielding the best candidate for their paying client, especially if there's no job connected with their enquiry. Scoundrels.