Compliance, Standards and Professionalism in Recruitment

Since joining the REC I’ve spent a lot of time talking to members about the direction we are taking as an industry.

The market is changing and now more than ever what you do is pivotal to the success of UK plc. As your clients contend with an uncertain political environment, entrenched talent shortages, and evolving workforce expectations, they're looking for recruitment experts to provide added-value services to help them compete and thrive. Recruitment is redefining itself as a professional service.

The REC’s role in this is to help create a political and social environment in which the value of the recruitment industry is fully recognised and respected. Every day we champion our members to politicians, and demonstrate that recruitment is a highly-regulated, compliance-focussed, and socially progressive part of the economy.

The REC compliance assessment

At the heart of our message about professionalism in recruitment is our compliance assessment , which we ask all members to take every two years to prove that they are maintaining the high standards we set.

The REC is the only professional body in the UK to require the businesses it represents to take a assessment as a prerequisite for membership, to investigate complaints from candidates and clients, and to expel the non-compliant.

We take this extremely seriously. Since January 2015, we have refused entry to 85 agencies because they did not pass our compliance assessment or failed to submit compliant terms. We removed 81 agencies from membership in January 2017 because they failed to pass our online compliance assessment, and we’ve removed three more agencies from membership since then for breaching our Code. That’s 169 organisations that the REC has denied membership to in the last three and a half years.

In January 2019 we will remove all agencies that fail to pass the compliance assessment by the end of the current cycle.

We are prepared to refuse membership to agencies because it means we have confidence in the businesses we represent. To be sure of a high quality professional service, we advise people to only work with a recruiter who is a member of the REC and therefore accountable to us for compliance with the law and adherence to our standards.

In turn, this means that the REC badge is a mark of quality which can be trusted by clients and candidates.

It’s more important than ever that we demonstrate the value of recruitment. If your business is due to take the compliance assessment before 31 December your compliance contact will have already received details, and I encourage you to complete the assessment as soon as possible. If you need support, you can book onto one of our compliance workshops, or contact the team with any questions.