Hiring for a temp assigment

GLC

We will be hiring a person for a short-term temp assignment to cover for someone who will be on FMLA for 3 months. If we put the person on our payroll, do we have to offer them the same benefits as our current employees, such as vacation and sick leave? It is too costly to use a temp agency so we thought about hiring the person ourselves.

TN HR

You do not have to offer them benefits if you classify them as such (temporaries, floaters, casuals). The caveat here is that you should have a policy/staffing plan in place that adresses these different status of employment.

The most important thing here is that the conditions of employment are cleary understood up-front. When you do so, make sure that it's in writing but that whatever you communicate does not alter the at-will status if this applies to your state.

Last but not least, you may or may not have UI issues (not sure how your state would burden you on a 3 month gig).

Good luck.

Gene

Don D

I don't agree with your conclusion that it costs too much to go the temp route. For most of our temps, we pay the agency $12 and they pay the worker $8. Same for factory and office. No comp costs or responsibility, no UI taxes added, no FICA, no benefits, on and on. Well worth four bucks an hour.

lhill

I would vote for going the temp agency route. In Texas temporary workers can file for unemployment even though there was a stated beginning-end to the employment. This is another thing you can avoid with a temp agency.

HRCalico

Our policy manual defines temp employees as only eligible for benefits mandated by law and our incentive plan. If I can find someone to hire off the street that doesn't mind working short term, I may do that. However, temp agencies do a certain amount of screening, which I find somewhat comforting. And I also found that by shopping around for temp agencies, we lowered our "rate" from 1.77 - 1.85 to 1.45. BIG difference. We have been fortunate enough to make two hires at the end of a temp period - it gives us a chance to see if they're any good. We have also sent a couple of people back to the agency because they weren't so good, and they sent us replacements. Made my job easier.