The contract with a staffing agency: what to watch

Two different contractual relationships

In direct hire you conclude a contract with the agency whose subject is finding and pre-selecting a candidate. You then conclude the employment contract with that person directly and carry all employer duties. The relationship with the supplier effectively ends there — apart from arrangements that reach into the future: the fee, protection of presented candidates, and compensation.

In agency employment the structure is different. The agency remains the employer, concludes an agreement on temporary assignment with you as the user, and you allocate work and give instructions to the employee.

What should be agreed in writing

Whatever the model, disputes arise where an oral understanding was relied on, or the assumption that "this is simply customary". The list below is not exhaustive, but it covers the points that prove decisive in practice — and adding them once the cooperation has already started is usually one-sidedly disadvantageous.

• The scope of the brief: the role, the qualification requirements, the place of work, the shift pattern
• The fee, the base on which it is calculated, and when it falls due
• Exclusivity, and the period for which it is agreed
• The term of the contract and how it is extended
• Protection of presented candidates, and the period for which a presentation applies
• Compensation, or return of part of the fee, on an early termination
• The division of responsibility for occupational safety and protective equipment at the user’s workplace
• Arranging occupational health assessments, and passing on information about the risks
• Handling the personal data of candidates and employees
• How the cooperation ends, and how briefs in progress are settled

Comparable conditions are not a matter for negotiation

In temporary assignment an agency employee is entitled under the Czech Labour Code to pay and working conditions comparable with a comparable core employee of the user. It is not a concession that can be traded away in negotiation; it is a statutory requirement, and a contract can only implement it, not change or exclude it.

In practice that means the user has to give the agency the data needed to meet it: who the comparable employee is, what pay conditions apply to the work, and what premiums and allowances attach to the shift schedule. Compliance is subject to inspection by the Czech labour inspection authorities, and the contract should therefore determine who supplies these data and how they are updated when conditions at the user change.

Safety, protective equipment and health assessments

The user runs the workplace but the agency is the formal employer, so responsibility is not one-sided and the contract should break it down into specific tasks rather than a general sentence about "cooperation". The user knows the risks, the environment and the equipment; the agency keeps the employment documentation and is the addressee of the employer’s duties.

What belongs in the contract above all:

• Initial and repeat training on the risks of the specific workplace
• Who provides personal protective equipment, and who pays for it
• Passing on the data needed for occupational health assessments
• Recording time worked, and passing those records between the parties
• The procedure in the event of an accident at work, including reporting and cooperation in the investigation

Protection of candidates’ personal data

During recruitment, CVs, evidence of qualifications and other personal data pass between the parties. The contract should determine the extent to which they are transferred, the purpose you may use them for, how long you keep them, and what happens to the data of candidates who do not start. Copies of certificates, which are routinely taken for specialist roles, deserve particular attention — from certificates to material on fitness for work.

The extent of data transferred should match the purpose. If a supplier sends more than is needed for a decision on filling the role, that is not an extra service but a risk passed to you.

Compensation for early termination, and ending the cooperation

A compensation arrangement is among the sensitive points, and among those that only get addressed once they are needed. A replacement is not something we promise in advance, and the terms of a replacement or of refunding part of the fee are agreed before the work begins rather than after someone leaves. It is not a promise that no departure will occur — nobody can give such a promise. It is an agreement on what happens if one does. In writing, therefore: the relevant period, the reasons that count within it, and the cases that exclude a claim — the role being cancelled, a substantial change to the brief, termination by the user, or conditions for starting not being met on the user’s side.

It should be equally clear how the cooperation ends: notice conditions, settlement of briefs in progress, what becomes of candidates already presented, and which arrangements continue to apply after termination. For temporary assignment there is in addition the manner in which an assignment is recalled, and the run-off of the assigned employees’ wage claims.