Starting a recruitment consultancy in the UK

[JonnyH11]

I am thinking about starting a recruitment consultancy in the UK. At the moment I have limited knowledge about the industry first hand but I have been researching for the past 6 months. I also have many contacts in the industry.

I was wondering if anyone knew the main steps in starting a consultancy eg:

General Costs
Legal
Processes
How many placements a new small firm generates every month
ETC.

If someone could help me I would be very grateful.

Thanks

[Markandshez]

Get a job in the industry for a year. These are springing up all over the place and most are failing within 12 months.

Recruitment/ Agency businesses almost always have trouble with cash flow and usually need a lot of cash to prime the business because they are dealing with people who want paying quickly on the one hand, and businesses that are slow to pay you on the other.

If you are pure recruitment it is easier but then you fall into the trap of people taking your staff on without paying you - your T & Cs need to be watertight as not many businesses will be happy to pay you the 17% that seems to be the industry norm without a fight

[Oneeyedvic]

Cashflow is generally not a problem to recruitment agencies as there are some specialist packages by Factoring companies for exactly this scenario.

If you have a contract with Employer 1, they will generally pay you after 30 days. Employee 1 will want paying weekly. Factoring company will pay Employee 1 on the strength of the contract (and creditworthiness) of Employer 1. Employer 1 will then pay the factoring company and the factoring company will then pay you the balance (after they have taken out their charges)