‘Back door hires’, ‘back door placements’, or ‘back dooring’ is a regular and frustrating occurrence for Recruiters worldwide. This is when a client engages a candidate without letting you know thus avoiding your fee. Sometimes it is a deliberate attempt to avoid payment, often it is simply poor process at the client or a misunderstanding of their obligations.
In this example our client approached us after they had become aware that a candidate they had introduced to a customer several months earlier, had commenced employment there but without the customer informing the recruitment consultant of the job offer or start.
When they approached their customer to raise and discuss the matter our client was surprised that the response was simply; ‘we are not paying you for this candidate, we didn’t want them when you introduced them but later we did, for a different role and we already had their CV on file’. That was it, their reason for non-payment. Our client soon realised that they were wasting their own time trying to talk sense with the debtor so engaged our no win – no fee service.
We established contact with their debtor, explained the obligations under the recruitment terms, why they had breached their obligation and why they now were required to pay (including late payment fees). It took a degree of effort and persistence however payment was achieved. Our collectors deal with back door cases on a daily basis, they know how to persuade the debtor to pay without the need for legal action.
Of course many agencies are already searching for back door hires using manual methods. This can be extremely time consuming especially to carry out a thorough search. The key to having a successful discovery process is to run it regularly, either monthly or quarterly. You never know when the evidence of the back door placement will appear, the engagement may occur months after the interview, and it may take months after that for it to be traceable. Sterling’s HireChecker system automates the process so that you can spend your time fulfilling new placements confident that any back doors that do occur will be uncovered. We suggest you use HireChecker regularly to get best results (monthly or quarterly).
