Why recruitment agencies are useless - by a candidate

So, so true! And you're a young person - I'm nearly 63 and have seen these agencies get seemingly worse and worse. No effort is made to match the candidate to the job, it's a case of "we've got a vacancy at X, you'll have to do". Not a match made in heaven for either party. I also will be applying direct from now on.

I totally empathise with you in this.
I've had to go through agencies as jobs I've seen are via agency only. So this is the 4th time an agency has let me down.
I had all the promise of being put forward for several roles to hear nothing. They clearly either don't do their jobs properly and are not proactive at all. Surely after a week and 1/2 of not hearing anything you'd think they'd phone to at least fill me in on the details instead of leaving me hanging
Your so right. They dangle the carrots, are full of false promises, future fakers like narcissists.
This has also happened to me in a volunteer role I've decided to call it a day on.
Prior to that I had 2 meetings with confirmation of paid work, CEO saw me CV etc and wanted to take me on, and we'd be sorting out paperwork and hours the next time I went in.
No. That. Didn't. Happen.
The job offer has not been mentioned since and I'm refusing to go back as they literally now have me stuffing envelopes. That's not what I signed up for. The woman in charge future faked like agency staff do. So it's not just agencies who string us along.

Also, don't you find that a lot of these agency workers sounds like they have literally left school. Zero line experience zero people skills. It's all a game to them. They're all narcissists.
I do wonder if half of these jobs even exist that you see online.
Adecco are real rubbish. I contacted them over the period of 3 weeks about a job I'd seen on their website to find out the job was from the previous year and someone forgot to update the website!!

So I complained to the head office about this particular branch and I feel since then they have blacklisted me for just pointing out that there were old jobs on the website giving ppl like myself false hopes.

I could really go on ...Michael page another week known agency are utterly useless. There's loads. They've got all these fancy websites that house old outdated jobs. The phones are manned by kids...

I recall about 15 years ago when I was a temp I could get work by phoning up and I'd be in work the following Monday. I was always in work with agencies after finishing uni.
It's not like that now.
They're created these hurdles for even now temp jobs. Now I'm looking for perm or temp or whatever it's near to impossible to get past the CV sending to the employer stage with agencies.
But are they really REALLY passing your CV on? Or are they stringing us along?.

What's really annoying is once the agent tells you where the job is I usually Google the company. More often than not, the jobs are all listed on those companies websites anyway. So why the hell and how the hell have agencies become involved in your job application process. I could have many a time just applied to the employer direct when it states so on the companies website! But you're right, the agencies get in the way and create the barrier. I don't think they do send any CV onto the employer. I think this is all to keep their KPI target up for the year.
What they don't realise that by messing us job seekers around is that it can have a detrimental effect. It can really get you down and then you begin to wonder can I be arsed to look for a job today? It's very hard to not spiral into a void of depression.
Going back to that voluntary role which I was hoping would turn out to be paid then was told it would be... Then nothing...I was so excited that day I cried with happiness as I thought this takes the pressure off me for a bit. Everything is just a struggle at the minute and for a job has to be one of the most stressful things ever.

I certainly wouldn't recommend going to an agency to anyone.
You're much better if applying to the company direct! I'll take my own advice there and do just that.

I agree absolutely. In the education field, I can report a poor experience with Protocol, Teacher Active, Hays, Education People, and Teaching Personnel. All approached me and then delivered little or nothing. They still took it upon themselves to waste not only my time but that of my referees, made no effort to match me to potentially suitable roles or find out about the destination school (where it is, for instance). Admittedly I am older now and less willing to stand for nonsense, and you may say "so many agents, it must be you, not them". It's them. Schools are female-heavy environments full of Aunt Lydia types; the agents these days are more men and, in the charming way that some men (and some women) have, talk a good game and don't mean a word of it. I use to office temp many years ago, and I know agents. There were always those that ran on a "jobs for our friends" basis, but with the shrunken jobs pool of 25 more years of "free" market capitalism, it is now standard.

Well I had a different problem with recruitment agents, they apparently have little common sense. They have been forwarding me roles that I have little chance of getting e.g. I'm an analyst in the non profit sector and they think I'm the right fit for investment banking. I'm flattered but it's frankly a waste of my time. Do they not have any awareness of what employers want? On so many occasions they asked me for consent to share my CV with their "clients" only to never hear from them again. The most pointless are the calls with agency members, I know I'm good at interviewing as my last job search resulted in 4 offers (I ended up finally taking the last) but of course whenever this happens with recruiter it's just radio silence afterwards.

I know exactly what you mean, the experience I have had and witnessed has been mind boggling over promise under deliver am a experienced warehouse distribution ops manager and its been such a torrid journey with most of the agencies to be fair, & am still searching.

Unfortunately, my sister works in this hollow sector and informs me the best way to annoy them in these days of GDPR is if you hear nothing from them contact them by email and ask them to remove you from their databases and not contact you again and to confirm it by email when done.
Under GDPR you have the right to 'be forgotten'

6 months ago I took over as Operations Director for a SME involved in the biotech sector. I was absolutely horrified at what the company was paying to recruitment agencies in fees for temp staff. We employ full time a HR manager who is fully qualified and a HR assistant we are paying through her qualifications. There where a handful of agencies on the PSL, and one particular agent who believed he was allowed to turn up on site and wander around anytime he felt like.
I've got rid of the PSL, made the HR department aware of their responsibilities. The agents still ring daily but now when we need temp staff we employ them on our contract for 3_6 months pay them the same as perm staff and save around £65,000 p.a. Everyone's a winner, except the recruitment vampires!

A couple of tips if you have to use these vampires are;

1. Buy a payg SIM that you can bin when you get work or change your number, giffgaff are a good choice because they allow you to change your number.

2. Set up an email you can close when you get work, Yahoo or Gmail are good options.

3. If you can get around it never give them your address/real address.

I stopped using them a couple of years ago. I know there are a few goods ones out there unfortunately the other 90% have tarnished them.
I regularly get calls in work from agencies touting for business and more often than not I just put the phone down on them, unprofessional but satisfying!

In my experience recruitment agencies scour company job sites then advertise that they are working 'exclusively' for 'their' client. Laughable when you see several adverts that are identical.

I have stopped using them. Despicable low-lifes in the main. I do, however, use their efforts. From their adverts I track down the company that is really looking to employ someone. This should, in theory, give a competitive advantage over someone being 'sold' by an agency. No recruitment agency commission.

I actually did this yesterday. Agency called me about a role and they suggested my CV was a waste of time for the employer as I lived too far away. I said, "Fine." I tracked down said company using the details provided by the agency and have an interview next week.

Totally agree......everyone's banging on about oh there's loads of jobs out there so if that's the case why is everyone still unemployed.... And as far as recruitment agencies they can't see past there own nose!!!! How some people get to work in these agencies heaven only knows they give out thr impression they will help you when all there doing is helping them selves. You apply fgor jobs you know your capable of doing but thats it nothing no acknowledgement or call you back...

Hello I find this first comment hard to say but their are genuinely reliable agencies out their however their are very few of them as I have consistently found out. I'm currently unemployed & have spoken to over a dozen this week alone who have all insisted on needing my personal details then when they have them yes that's right .....nothing apart from excuses & time wasting once I actually turned up to register with an agency 20 miles away for a job only to get a phone call to be told the job wasn't available then an hour later it was this yo yo game went on half the day the other half I returned to them to tell them to remove my details & pay me for my wasted time ( I was reasonable ) they did. I won't be wasting my time with the good or bad ever again. Unless they pay me for my time first

Agents are uneducated chavs who can't get a real job. Scumbags one and all. Hate the ground they walk on.

Ive joined 15 😡agencies and all the jobs recruitment consultant have put me through to
have gone in house. They are all time wasters. There should be a law out .

I despise Job Agencies, they are the lowest common denominator, a blot on the landscape of the job market. All they are concerned with is making money, they have zero interest as you as a candidate, they just care about when their next pay cheque is arriving and for how much it's going to be.

You have no choice but to use these useless individuals as the market has nigh on been swallowed up with these low life talentless retches who base everything on face value and the entire procedure of being able to verbally sell yourself to a prospective employer has been lost as a result.

They never ring you back when they say they're going to, they make promises of jobs that don't exist to keep you on a lead, they use your LinkedIn account and email in an attempt to harness your popularity to promote their vile advertising campaigns, bombard you with jobs of no relevance bar a keyword embedded in the text and most annoying of all, they take a huge cut for it for your prospective employer.

What exactly do they do to earn their money, it's not like they're rushing about ringing you up, they're just glorified CV pickers, slimey arrogant twerps who rummage through clients to pick the 'best ones', judging candidates, in a lot of cases, badly, while basking in their own deluded self importance.

Oh and they lie, they don't even think twice about it, the lies come streaming out of their mouths like pinocchio on crack, just to make sure they clinch that deal and make their commission. If it means the job later turns out to not be what you thought because they lied, it matters not to them, you're just cannon fodder - as long as they can make sure you stay for 6 months so they can get paid, their 'job' is done. ASSHOLES.

I am amazed that employers still stand for it, I've noticed larger companies still do the employment process themselves, saving themselves money and forcing away these blood sucking maggots with a long pole, just like all employers should.

Hopefully more employers will start to see sense and then we can get back to the good old days where the employment process wasn't such a time and money consuming chore.