Hello All,
First off, as my name here suggests, I used to work in recruitment, so feel free to coat me off accordingly. I was successful, but to be frank, didn't witness any of the dubious practices some of my industry peers appear to pull off when reading some of your comments on here. I was more often than not financially retained by construction companies to search for executives and niche staff. Anyways, 2 years ago, a client of mine offered me a Business Development role in house and I love it.
It was here that I first encountered recruitment consultants as a client and immediately understood why they have such a bad press - untrained idiots without even a modicum of intellect or professionalism.
I thought you all might like to here what's occurred in the last three weeks or so as I think it is absolutely shocking to be frank.
It started one day when we received a call from an Indian sounding guy purporting to be a client of ours who we know intimately. I spoke to him and it was evident he wasn't who he said he was. After qualifying this, I put the phone down on him. He called back immediately and it was obvious it was him again. This time he was pretending to be someone else. Effectively, he was fishing for mobile numbers for our staff. A few times, he was able to speak to some of our staff and had some joy in getting what he was looking for. One of my colleagues was caught off guard and passed my mobile number to him. Cheers! An email was sent to all and we cut him off at the pass.
Over the next week or so, we must've had 100 calls a day from him.
At my wits end, I spoke to some friends who still work in recruitment and it transpires numerous headline construction recruitment companies have outsourced name gathering to the subcontinent as a cost effective means of generating their potential candidate database.
The next time he called, I made an attempt to befriend him. He openly admitted to generating over 700 names and numbers personally and that there were over 150 people like him in a call centre all attacking the construction industry.
Then I received a call from him and he clearly had no receollection of our last call - probably a reflection of speaking to so many people. He asked me to call him on his mobile - all other calls he made had come from a withheld number.
When I called this number a man from England answered and didn't go by the name I'd been given. He told me who he worked for and we politely ended the call. I called HO of the company he worked for to confirm he was legit and he was. I explained to this company what had happened and the lady there said the same was happening to them and it was driving them crazy.
Then, I started getting calls on my mobile from people who he had asked to call him back on. It made no sense whatsoever and was clearly agrreiving countless people.
I called our telephone provider yesterday and they are looking into it. I called OFCOM, but they said that as the calls are originating from overseas, they are powerless.
Things have calmed down since yesterday, but I'll keep you updated - I've informed the news editor of a trade publication and they are investigating.
I am determined to identify the recruitment companies responsible for this - I have been given names of two who have done it in the past, but nothing concrete as yet.
Tossers.
First off, as my name here suggests, I used to work in recruitment, so feel free to coat me off accordingly. I was successful, but to be frank, didn't witness any of the dubious practices some of my industry peers appear to pull off when reading some of your comments on here. I was more often than not financially retained by construction companies to search for executives and niche staff. Anyways, 2 years ago, a client of mine offered me a Business Development role in house and I love it.
It was here that I first encountered recruitment consultants as a client and immediately understood why they have such a bad press - untrained idiots without even a modicum of intellect or professionalism.
I thought you all might like to here what's occurred in the last three weeks or so as I think it is absolutely shocking to be frank.
It started one day when we received a call from an Indian sounding guy purporting to be a client of ours who we know intimately. I spoke to him and it was evident he wasn't who he said he was. After qualifying this, I put the phone down on him. He called back immediately and it was obvious it was him again. This time he was pretending to be someone else. Effectively, he was fishing for mobile numbers for our staff. A few times, he was able to speak to some of our staff and had some joy in getting what he was looking for. One of my colleagues was caught off guard and passed my mobile number to him. Cheers! An email was sent to all and we cut him off at the pass.
Over the next week or so, we must've had 100 calls a day from him.
At my wits end, I spoke to some friends who still work in recruitment and it transpires numerous headline construction recruitment companies have outsourced name gathering to the subcontinent as a cost effective means of generating their potential candidate database.
The next time he called, I made an attempt to befriend him. He openly admitted to generating over 700 names and numbers personally and that there were over 150 people like him in a call centre all attacking the construction industry.
Then I received a call from him and he clearly had no receollection of our last call - probably a reflection of speaking to so many people. He asked me to call him on his mobile - all other calls he made had come from a withheld number.
When I called this number a man from England answered and didn't go by the name I'd been given. He told me who he worked for and we politely ended the call. I called HO of the company he worked for to confirm he was legit and he was. I explained to this company what had happened and the lady there said the same was happening to them and it was driving them crazy.
Then, I started getting calls on my mobile from people who he had asked to call him back on. It made no sense whatsoever and was clearly agrreiving countless people.
I called our telephone provider yesterday and they are looking into it. I called OFCOM, but they said that as the calls are originating from overseas, they are powerless.
Things have calmed down since yesterday, but I'll keep you updated - I've informed the news editor of a trade publication and they are investigating.
I am determined to identify the recruitment companies responsible for this - I have been given names of two who have done it in the past, but nothing concrete as yet.
Tossers.
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