thats true ive never done agency before so the ££££ signs drew me in lol
Ok tin hat on but the last agency I was with were really good and without them getting me into poundland I wouldn’t have got a permanent job.
When I first passed a few years ago (class 2) I signed to a couple of agencies. They both kept me in a bit of work (I only wanted bits and bats anyway, ) understood fully what I was happy doing and when and after I did one job which was a complete and utter nightmare they paid me an extra couple of hours as a sorry and thankfully didn’t put me there again, for every bodies safety it was a wise move!
This is more about “good clients” and “bad clients”. Perhaps we should start a thread on “the employer yards you really don’t want to work for” along with reasons why… Being screwed about, unpleasant work, low pay, in the middle of nowhere, no training, worthless experience, etc etc…
Why do people so hate supermarket work for example?
Me? - I dislike Pallet work, since when I’m covering one on agency, I always seem to be in the queue 3 hours plus, get told to “take 15 in the queue, half an hour whilst doing the curtains for backload” and am struggling to get a proper (eating!) break on the way home, because my 15 hours is dangerously close to expiry… 
Agencies are the same as any other business. Some good, some bad! I have had as much or as little work with an agency with exclusivity at one client since September. An incident occurred on Sunday and i decided to work the rest of the days i agreed to then move on. On Friday i got a txt with shifts starting on Sunday and i phoned them and said no. After a discussion they agreed to my minimum rate and find me work elsewhere. No problem at all! The client has talked me into one more week to see if the issue can be resolved. In the meantime, a different client has offered me a better deal which i am very keen on if the politics can be worked out. Their current agency is not an option 
you sign with about 5 or 6 agencies then you weed out the idiot ones ,I am with rapier and have been for 15 months with no problems at all,regular work 4 to 5 days a week,the money could be better but that’s life
truckman020:
you sign with about 5 or 6 agencies then you weed out the idiot ones ,I am with rapier and have been for 15 months with no problems at all,regular work 4 to 5 days a week,the money could be better but that’s life
If you accept low pay, the only problem will ever be compounding your losses each day at that rate because each and every shift stands up.
Pay £50 a day in time, fuel, wear & tear on car getting to a job that pays £50 a day gross (minimum wage for 9 hours less 1 hour unpaid break) means you’ll lose more money each and every time you go to work.
Rapier reeled me in with promises of £12ph “midweek rate” and £18 “sunday rate” for which I eventually only got offered day jobs flat 8 hours in London for some crappy other rate nowhere near even £12ph - which turned out to be the midweek contractor rate for nights. Avoid.
There must be a lot who really don’t mind being disappointed, and lied to - otherwise they’d have stopped doing this as ‘standard procedure’ by now surely?
If you can’t pick and choose the work that actually pays their headline rates - there’s no point bothering - and that’s anywhere. No wonder so many believe the only business agencies deal in is “lies”.