Temporary staffing: agency workers for peaks and cover

The agency charges you an hourly or daily rate. Out of it, it pays the worker's wages, holiday pay, employer's National Insurance and pension contributions, and keeps a margin. When comparing rates, ask each agency for the breakdown between pay rate and charge rate, and confirm whether overtime, night and weekend work are charged at different rates.

General workers for picking, packing or production lines are usually easy to find at short notice. Skilled workers such as electricians, welders, forklift drivers or HGV drivers are fewer, and the agency should check their cards, licences and certificates before supply. For seasonal peaks, brief the agency weeks before you need people; for short-notice cover, ask what it can realistically fill by tomorrow morning.

Under the Agency Workers Regulations 2010, an agency worker who has worked in the same role with the same hirer for 12 continuous calendar weeks, over one or more assignments, is entitled to the same basic working and employment conditions as if you had recruited them directly. That covers pay, working time, rest breaks, night work, and annual leave. Breaks in the assignment can pause or reset the count depending on the reason.

Two rights apply from the first day: access to your collective facilities and amenities, such as the canteen, childcare and transport, and information about vacancies in your business. To meet the 12-week rule, the agency will need your pay rates and terms for comparable roles, so be ready to provide them.

The old exemption for agency workers on permanent contracts with pay between assignments, known as the Swedish derogation, was abolished in April 2020. An agency proposing that model today is out of date.

Source: gov.uk · legislation.gov.uk

Agencies often charge a transfer fee if you employ a worker they supplied. The Conduct of Employment Agencies and Employment Businesses Regulations 2003 limit this. A transfer fee is only enforceable if the contract gives you the option of an extended period of hire instead of paying it, on terms no less favourable than before. And no fee can be charged if you take the worker on after the later of two points: 14 weeks from the first day they worked for you through the agency, or 8 weeks after their last day on assignment.

Read the transfer fee clause and check that it reflects these limits before you sign. The same rules apply if a worker supplied by one agency comes back to you through another.

Source: legislation.gov.uk

Some agencies pay workers through umbrella companies, which employ the worker and run payroll. From 6 April 2026, where an umbrella company employs the worker, HMRC can recover unpaid PAYE income tax and National Insurance from the agency that contracts with you or, if no agency is involved, from you as the end client. Ask the agency which umbrella companies are in the chain and how it checks them.

The off-payroll working rules, known as IR35, are a separate question. They apply when a contractor supplies their services through their own limited company. If your business is medium or large, or in the public sector, you must decide whether the contractor would be an employee for tax purposes and pass a status determination to the agency. For ordinary temps paid through the agency's payroll or an umbrella company, IR35 does not usually apply.

Source: gov.uk

Labour providers supplying workers for agricultural work, gathering shellfish, or processing and packaging agricultural produce, fish or shellfish need a gangmasters licence, now issued by the Fair Work Agency. Using an unlicensed provider for this work is itself an offence for the hirer. Check the provider on the public register of licence holders before workers arrive.

Health and safety is shared. The agency must obtain information from you about the role and any known risks, and you remain responsible for induction, training on your equipment and supervision at your site. Agree in writing who provides personal protective equipment and who holds records such as forklift authorisations.

The agency, as the employer or engager, carries out right to work checks on the people it supplies. Ask how it does them, and do not specify candidates by nationality, age or any other protected characteristic in your brief.

• number of workers, roles and skills or cards needed
• start date, assignment length and shift pattern
• site address, reporting point and induction arrangements
• PPE supplied by whom
• pay rates for comparable permanent staff for the 12-week rule
• transfer fee clause and notice period to end an assignment

Give us your company size, the job field, how many workers you need, the assignment length, whether shifts are involved and the start date. We check your phone number with a code sent by text and your email address with a link, then offer the requirement without your name or contact details to staffing agencies in your area. Once one agency has bought it, it is gone from our shop; the agency pays Offrano and you pay nothing.

The agency's name, address and phone number reach you by email before it gets your details. An agency may choose not to take the request, so for urgent cover keep your usual options open; unsold requests are withdrawn after 21 days. We check that agencies are registered businesses and nothing more. Their licence, if needed, and terms are for you to check.