When I was a manager for Palmers in 2003 ,Palmers as a group were stopped from using labour agencies. There were 2 reasons for this, firstly the official reason was that they were rubbish at that time, secondly the unofficial reason, one of their (Palmers) managers (who will remain nameless) owened one of the agencies and gave a good proportion of his depot's work to his agency, made a load of money , retired to Spain then left his son in charge ! sounds like Coronel Gadaffi.
In the current economic climate with some of the bigger firm trying to re-establish themselves ( Interserve) its not in their intrest to carry a large number PAYE employees in case they run out of work, not withstanding the fact that people are reluctant to leave a reliable job and take a chance on a new firm.
Agencies are far more flexible and seem to have gotten their acts together now.
When Palmers employed them they really were worse than having no one on site at all, it was that bad. I remember asking a particular "Grade A" agency lad who we were being charged £140 a day for, to cut off a tube fouling a ladder access. He tried cutting though it with a handsaw his mate had just used to cut a board !!!!
In the current economic climate with some of the bigger firm trying to re-establish themselves ( Interserve) its not in their intrest to carry a large number PAYE employees in case they run out of work, not withstanding the fact that people are reluctant to leave a reliable job and take a chance on a new firm.
Agencies are far more flexible and seem to have gotten their acts together now.
When Palmers employed them they really were worse than having no one on site at all, it was that bad. I remember asking a particular "Grade A" agency lad who we were being charged £140 a day for, to cut off a tube fouling a ladder access. He tried cutting though it with a handsaw his mate had just used to cut a board !!!!