The Office of Fair Trading (OFT) has imposed fines totalling £129.5m on 103 construction firms in England which it ruled had colluded with competitors on building contracts.??
The heaviest fine (£17.9m) was handed out to contractor Kier, while Interserve (£11.6m), Balfour Beatty (£5.2m), Carillion (£5.4m), John Sisk (£6.2m), Connaught (£5.6m) and Galliford Try (£8.3m) were also fined.
Retail giant Tesco has agreed a deal with Bond International Software to use its online recruitment and applicant tracking systems.
Bond Talent will be introduced at Tesco’s UK head office operations based in Cheshunt, Hertfordshire, where 300 external hires and 400 internal moves are expected over the next year.
International staffing group Empresaria has appointed Joost Kreulen as head of Asia from 1 January.
Falling demand in the construction sector has hit manufacturers and the agencies which supply their staff.
The sale of construction products has reached a new low, according to the latest Construction Products Association Activity Barometer and recruiters are noticing a drop in factory placement numbers.
Employment services provider Parasol has acquired specialist accountancy practice Quay Accounting. Quay provides accounting services for freelancers.
Gordon Brown has pledged £500m to help people who have been unemployed for more than six months into jobs or work-based training as the government attempts to stem further increases in unemployment.
Diversified Search Ray & Berndtson in New York is seeing demand for retained search services, despite warnings from other executive search firms in the US.
In response to a CNN article last week, Mike Wellman, managing director of the Ray & Berndtson in New York, told Recruiter:
Executive recruitment firm Denton Search has launched in Mayfair, London.
Focusing on the search-to-search and rec-to-rec sectors, managing director Natalie Denton says the company specialises in placing partners, consultants and associates across all market sectors within executive recruitment firms.
The company will cover the European and Middle East markets.
Some of India’s best graduates are set to take up internships in UK firms.
This follows UK-India Education and Research Initiative (UKIERI) award of a new three-year contract to recruitment processing outsourcing applicant tracking system provider GTI Recruiting Solutions.
The UKIERI aims to improve educational links between the UK and India.
A City HR headhunter is charging its clients an hourly rate rather than a bulk instalment up front.
The pre-arranged agreement allows clients to spread the cost of an assignment, Alison Hughes, director at Higher Talent, told Recruiter.
Hughes said the downturn has caused many clients to balk at a £10,000 retainer.