Talking about backdoor hires and disputed fees can sound a bit… sinister, but sometimes (stress on sometimes) there wasn’t anything underhand happening.
There is a good chance your client didn’t mean to skip the fee, maybe they’ll just pay once they receive an invoice. Maybe they genuinely didn’t realise they needed to pay you or that you made the original introduction.
So unless you have good reason to think the client was being nefarious, always start by assuming and acting as if the client expects to pay your fee. No need to shout or scream down the phone at client or candidate, or even to hire someone like us to do that for you; you might well just get paid with a ‘congratulations on the hire’ email.
Only when things ramp up a notch do you need to consider different angles.
It’s typically only once you find yourself hitting a wall with the excuses, know there was something dodgy going on or when you don’t want to be directly aggressive with a client (one you’d like to work with again) that you might want to consider the backdoor hire and disputed fee experts (us!) to take on the “discussion” for you. “Acting as if they will pay” can only get you so far in certain cases.
There are several reasons why you might want to hire recLAW to recover that disputed fee, but let us give you some hints:
- Time. It’s unlikely that on top of your usual business (recruiting!), you also have time to pursue the disputed fee/prove a backdoor hire has taken place.
- Expertise. recLAW are a rare breed – set up by a lawyer with recruitment experience, we are the true experts in backdoor hires. We’ve seen and heard it all so we know how to handle all the scenarios.
- Client relationship. If this is a valued client you’d like to resolve things with and work with in the future, it makes sense for you to step back from the dispute, to let someone else handle it on your behalf
- Money. You want your fee and we know how to get it and here’s the bonus – we don’t charge upfront fees or fixed costs per introduction, we only get paid when you get paid. This means zero exposure for your business. If we win you get the money you didn’t have before, and if we don’t you’re no worse off.
- Balance. Negotiating disputed fees can be a fine balancing act. This goes back to our expertise and your need to keep the client relationship on track – knowing when and how to apply pressure and when to play nice. When you’ve been backdoored it is easy to act rashly but this generally just entrenches clients. We keep an open mind throughout, but most importantly remain focused on achieving the best outcome for you.
If you’re reading this and it sounds like you need us – get in touch today!
