Recruitment fees, published in full

Every search we take on is priced as one fixed fee, set by the band your hire’s total package falls in and agreed in writing before we start. Because it is a fixed amount for the band rather than a percentage, improving your offer inside a band costs you nothing extra, where a percentage fee charges you more for paying your own hire more. The figure on the table below is the figure on the invoice.

There are two amounts, and they fall due at different times. The $800 engagement fee is payable to commence the search. The fixed fee for the band is then invoiced on the day your hire starts, charged on top of the engagement fee: it is never inclusive of it, and the engagement fee is never credited back against it. All figures on this page are ex-GST.

The fixed fee buys an exclusive search, and that is what makes the rest of it possible. While the search runs the role goes through us: you pause your own advertising for it, and anything arriving direct comes to us to weigh against the brief alongside everyone else. One pipeline, read once, to one standard. That is what a fixed price and a 30-day shortlist commitment are built on.

The fee table

The band is set by the total package: base salary, plus superannuation, plus any guaranteed extras. Above the top band the work is quoted to the brief rather than banded.

The ladder has a floor as well as a ceiling: packages below $60,000 are quoted to the brief rather than banded, the same as those above the top band. Either way the bespoke fee is agreed in writing before the search begins.

Three worked examples

Each of these runs in the order the money is actually charged, which is not the order a fee table implies. The engagement fee comes first and starts the search. The band fee follows once your candidate has accepted and started, and it is added to the engagement fee rather than absorbing it.

On a total package of $70,000: $800 starts the search. That package sits in the $60,000 – $75,000 band, so the fixed fee is $7,500, invoiced on your hire’s start date. You pay $8,300 in total. An agency charging 15% to 20% of the same package would invoice $11,000 to $14,000, so the same hire costs you between $2,700 and $5,700 less with us.

On a total package of $100,000: $800 starts the search. That package sits in the $95,001 – $110,000 band, so the fixed fee is $11,500, invoiced on your hire’s start date. You pay $12,300 in total. An agency charging 15% to 20% of the same package would invoice $15,000 to $20,000, so the same hire costs you between $2,700 and $7,700 less with us.

On a total package of $140,000: $800 starts the search. That package sits in the $130,001 – $150,000 band, so the fixed fee is $15,500, invoiced on your hire’s start date. You pay $16,300 in total. An agency charging 15% to 20% of the same package would invoice $21,000 to $28,000, so the same hire costs you between $4,700 and $11,700 less with us.

What the fixed fee covers

One fee, the whole search: we write and run the standard advertising at our own cost, and there is no shortlist fee and no hourly component. Two things sit outside it. Premium or specifically requested display advertising is agreed with you in advance and charged at cost, and any psychometric or specialist testing you ask for is at your cost.

• The advertisement, written by us and run under the talyn name
• Every application opened and read against your brief, not just the first stack in
• A phone screen with each applicant the reading says is worth one
• A shortlist that gives you the reasoning behind every name on it
• Interview scheduling and coordination with your team
• Reference checks on the candidate you choose
• Offer negotiation and management through to the day they start

If the package lands in a different band

The band follows what your hire actually accepts, not what was budgeted when we took the brief. Agree a package above the band we briefed against and the fee moves up to match it; agree one below and the fee moves down. The table decides it in both directions, and you will know the number before you make the offer.

The package is the annual gross base salary, plus superannuation, plus anything guaranteed. Guaranteed extras are not a closed list: a car allowance, a contractual loading, a thirteenth month, a guaranteed shift loading and a bonus or commission paid regardless of performance all count, and so does anything else the offer guarantees. A motor vehicle or other non-cash benefit is valued at its reasonable annual cost for the purpose of setting the band. The test is whether an amount is guaranteed, not what it is called: anything contingent on results sits outside the calculation, a discretionary bonus and commission that has to be earned being the usual examples. The band is set on the full-time-equivalent package, so a part-time role is banded on what the role pays at full time.

Hiring again within 6 months

Once we have placed someone with you, any further placement starting within 6 months of your most recent hire’s start date is charged at 20% off the fixed fee for its band. Each qualifying placement resets the window, so a steady run of hiring holds the discount indefinitely. Leave a longer gap and the next placement returns to the full fixed fee.

In the $95,001 – $110,000 band that takes the fixed fee from $11,500 to $9,200. The engagement fee is unchanged either way: it is charged once per search, it is never discounted, and it is never credited against the fixed fee. A replacement made under the guarantee is not a placement for this purpose, so it neither earns the discount nor resets the window.

When each amount is payable

The $800 engagement fee is payable to commence the search, and applies once per role brief we take on rather than once per placement. If one search produces two hires for you, there is no second engagement fee. A new role, or a new search, carries its own.

The fixed fee is invoiced on your hire’s start date and payable within 14 days.

Two cases where a start date never arrives. If the candidate withdraws before starting and that is not down to you, no fixed fee is payable, because the fixed fee is only ever invoiced on a start date, and we pick the search back up under the replacement guarantee if you want us to. If you withdraw the offer or decide not to proceed after the candidate has accepted, the full fixed fee is payable within 14 days of invoice: acceptance is the point at which the search and the selection are finished, and that is the work the fee buys.

Withdrawing a role part-way through a search is different again. Outside the shortlist guarantee below, the $800 engagement fee remains payable and is not refunded.

If it does not work out

On an exclusive engagement, if we have not delivered a shortlist worth interviewing within 30 days of your engagement-fee payment reaching us, you are entitled to a full refund of that engagement fee. Whether a shortlisted candidate is worth interviewing is your decision, and yours alone. The refund is not automatic: you claim it by telling us in writing that you are ending the engagement. It covers the engagement fee only and applies once per engagement. If you would rather not end it, the search simply continues and you keep that entitlement for as long as no shortlist worth interviewing has been delivered. How the day count treats time we spend waiting on you, and shortlists that go unanswered, is in our terms.

Once someone is placed, the guarantee runs the other way. If your hire resigns within 120 days of starting, or you end their employment within 90, we run the search again and replace them at no further fee. The remedy is the replacement itself rather than money back: the fixed fee is not refunded, and if the replacement’s package sits in a higher band you pay only the difference.

The conditions matter here. Tell us in writing within 14 days of the candidate’s last day. The role, reporting line, package and conditions need to be materially what was presented to the candidate at offer, and the fee for that placement needs to have been paid in full by its invoice due date. It runs once per placement and is not available for replacement candidates. It does not apply where the departure was caused by redundancy, restructure, a change in role scope or location, serious misconduct, or a breach by you of your obligations to the candidate. If we are given at least 4 weeks of exclusive opportunity and still cannot find the right replacement, you choose between continuing the search and taking a credit for the fixed fee against a future fee, valid 12 months. A cash refund is not payable. The operative wording is in our terms.

Talk to us about a role

Questions about exclusivity, who writes the advertisements, and the roles we will and will not take on are answered on the FAQ. When you have a role in mind, brief us on it and we will come back with our read on what it will take to fill.