Employers utilizing recruitment companies to discover short-lived or irreversible workers have particular duties.

Recruitment agencies that find staff for other businesses, however pay the personnel themselves, are called 'em ployment businesses'.

If you take on workers through an employment service, they're accountable for making sure the workers' rights under working time and base pay rules.

Recruitment agencies offering workers for farming, food processing, horticultural and shellfish-gathering markets are referred to as 'gangmasters' - if you use one, you require to make certain they are licensed gangmasters.

Employers' obligations

As a company, you're accountable for:

- company workers' health and safety
- ensuring they have the very same access to shared facilities as other workers
- letting them understand about relevant task vacancies in your service

However, you can stop providing work to a company worker, as long as they're not employed by you.

Additional rights after 12 weeks

After 12 weeks in the same job, agency workers are entitled to the exact same terms and conditions as workers doing the very same or similar work. This includes:

- pay
- working time, rest durations and breaks
- night work
- yearly leave
- time off for antenatal consultations for pregnant workers

For more information, see guidance on agency worker policies.

Transfer fees

Recruitment agencies can charge a transfer fee if you utilize an employee directly, or an employee is provided to you through another recruitment company after their preliminary contract. Recruitment firms should inform you in your agreement if they intend to charge you move charges.

When an agency employee starts deal with you, a recruitment agency can only charge a transfer fee if you take the worker on within either of the following periods, whichever ends later:

- 8 weeks of completion of their last assignment with you
- 14 weeks of the start of their first task with you

If there has been a break of 42 days between the employee's projects with you, the 14 weeks will start from the start date of the most recent task.

The recruitment company might also charge you a transfer fee if:

- you present an employee to a 3rd celebration who then employs them during this duration
- you utilize a worker introduced to you by a recruitment company before they have started their assignment with you through the agency

Extended hire period

If you employ a worker provided to you by a recruitment firm, the agency needs to use you an extended hire duration rather of charging you a transfer charge. This suggests they would continue to provide the employee to you for an agreed period without altering the terms of the project. Once the predetermined duration ends, you would utilize the employee straight without any transfer cost.

A recruitment company may charge you a transfer charge if they introduce an employee to you and you employ them:

- before they start work through the recruitment firm
- through a various company, before they begin overcome the introducing recruitment firm

In both cases, the presenting agency must use the choice of a hire period instead of charging you a transfer cost. The regards to this hire period must be set out in your agreement with the recruitment firm.