Start-up Solutions

Compared to some start-up businesses, not a lot! You'll need to a laptop, phone, and possibly office space. 

You will also need to consider: CRM, email and video calling, job boards, linkedin licence, back-office technology, finance, branding and website creation, accountants, legal/contractual support. 

Here at 3R, we have cost effective start-up packages and a robust Partner Network to support your start-up and give it a boost if you're looking to accelerate quickly!

This can vary depending on which suppliers and how many different ones you choose to partner with and where you will want the most help.

You can find robust start-up packages for hundreds of pounds investment, but always consider setting your business infrastructure up in the right way from the off to ensure it can grow without stalling.

Some of the most important outlays would be for a CRM, Contracts & Terms of Business, a brand & website, an accoutnant as well as back-office technology to administer your business.

It is still sensible to plan for and consider other investment into your business. For example setting money aside for job board advertising to help with early vacancies and the first couple of months of advertising before you start to bill. Others with more ambitious business plans may consider offices, phones & IT equipment.

In short, it can cost as little or as much as you need it to - to suit your plans and aspirations.

We recommend vetting your chosen partners to ensure you will get great service and support as well as value for money - always compare like for like to know if you are getting a good deal!

You can be up and running really quickly. The first step will be incorporating your company so you can trade. 

Then you need to work to get your systems and suppliers in place. 

At 3R we can work to agreed timescales and set-up takes between 1-2 weeks to enable you to start sourcing, placing and billing.

With an additional couple of weeks required to finalise a website build.

Without a funding partner - you get paid when your invoices are settled and you are responsible for creating and sending them as well as chasing up overdue payments.

With 3R, your business is paid every Friday with a detailed, line-by-line statement. No waiting for long payment terms or chasing late payments! 

Our Accounts team is here to support with credit checking, invoicing and credit control on your behalf. 

You also have full visibility of all financial transactions from our back-office platform. 

Making your first placement and getting paid for the first time are actually the same things at 3R. If it is a perm fee or contract margin; as soon as the invoice goes to your client, the margin is paid to you. This is a real help when starting up and bridging the gap between regular employed work and getting paid by your own business.

Our client base suggest your first earnings will come on average between the 2nd and 3rd month after going live. These ‘first starter’ estimates are still a little cautious.

Setting up your recruitment business with 3R means that everything is ready quickly, so you can focus on what you do best!  You can literally pick up the phone and start work straight away! It is therefore realistic to assume that an experienced, well-connected recruiter could start picking up vacancies within a fortnight and take at least one vacancy through to the offer stage by week six. It would be fair to expect your first perm invoice to be billed after 10 weeks. Consultants in faster-moving contract markets could expect first timesheets back early in the second month and margin in your bank the same week. 

From all the business plans that we have helped produce for start-ups, the average time it will take to receive monthly income the same or better than their usual net pay is less than 5 months!

Many people think it will take years to earn the same income that they are being paid as an employee of an agency. But when you consider that an agency only pays about 25% of what a senior consultant bills and then tax and NI is likely to account for a third of that income. Then take off rail fares, petrol & parking……….. If you are working for yourself and keeping most of the revenue, the task doesn’t seem that daunting!

Recruiters leaving the monthly paid comfort of working for an agency usually have personal financial commitments and need to be confident that they can return to their current earning levels quickly. The 3R model can help realise this in three ways.

1. All infrastructure and support are there for you quickly. You can hit the ground running and start billing quickly.
2. You are paid up to 90% of the fee income that you generate! and even more on contract! 
3. As a business owner, you are paid a tax-efficient combination of basic salary and dividends which means a significant reduction in your personal tax and NI.

Once you have reached the same level of income that you have been used to you can start to plot your growth onwards and upwards – maximise your personal earnings or start thinking about investing further in an office and more employees.

When we help consultants build their business plans we discuss realistic targets to help them plan their short-term earnings so that they can plan properly for running a business.

A few people are a little optimistic and need reigning in, but generally established recruiters are able to put together sensible plans.

The average ‘run rate’ in our start-up business plans is 60% of that being achieved in an agency environment – for example, £200k perm billers are forecasting £120k in year 1.

Contract recruiters will be placing contractors at a rate of 24 a year compared to employed levels of 40 a year. Of course, their contract plan will start from scratch again, but it can be seen how rapidly earnings can be generated from sensible growth forecasts.

Simply, you only pay for 3R's services when you make money. We take a % of each invoice we process on your behalf through our back office system.

Depending on the type of service you require from us, this could be for all your business or purely contract. 

Our comprehensive start-up package is a one-off, upfront cost covering a 12-month period. After this the bulk of our services are on a rolling-monthly contract.

Other support you should consider paying for would be a CRM system, a recruitment Account and possibly extra legal support.

We have a network of recruitment-specific partners to introduce you to and our Back Office technology integrates seamlesly with leading CRM systems.

When starting-up with 3R, you are 100% shareholder of your own business. Our contracts are flexible, dependant on the service you require.

They range from monthly rolling contracts for bespoke services to 1-year contracts for a recruiter on our comprehensive start-up solution.

The notice period on our monthly-rolling contracts is 30 days. 

We support you with a fully-outsourced back office platform, and funding, to manage your  operations and provide you with compliant audit trails, and real-time business reporting. 

As our systems are in-house we have a dedicated team to support you with any IT support you require. We can also offer training and best-practice advice to your teams where necessary. 

You will also need a CRM and we support integrations with many leading recruitment CRM providers. 

You might want to consider AI, Sourcing technologies and other RecTech and we have many partners and preferred-deals in our network for you to maximise on. 

You will want to consider public liability, professional indemnity and employers indemnity for your business.

Bad Debt Protection is included with our funding. The overall objective of bad debt protection is about safeguarding your business and reducing the risk of trading with clients. Read more about it here.

We can advice you of potential partners who will offer the most up-to-date advice about insurance.

You will need to consider:

• Terms of Business between you and your Clients.
• Contracts between you and your provisioned Workers/Contractors
• Employment Contracts between you and your Consultants
• Agreements with your suppliers

We have a suite of recruitment specific Worker Contracts and Terms of Business for you as part of our comprehensive start-up solution.

Our suite of contracts is available to our back-office and funding only clients too. They are updated regularly and re-issued as required. When the time comes for you to want your contracts to be a little more bespoke to your business we can introduce you to legal partners with recruitment experience.

As your service provider and partner to your business we will update our technology and services proactively to ensure they abide by any changes to or new laws and legislation.

Your dedicated 3R account manager will also be on hand to talk to at any time about such things. We run training sessions on new functionality and features and you can book a business consultation with our Senior Leaders for support on driving the growth of your business.

Simply, we only make money when you do by taking a percentage of each invoice we process.

Our funding solution is a pay-as-you-go service, with no monthly costs and full access to our Back Office platform

The only time there is an initial fee is for our comprehensive start-up packages.