A hiring manager has been burned. The last agency placed somebody who left in seven weeks, and the refund conversation took three months and a solicitor's letter.
She is now reading your website and the only question she actually has is the one you have not answered anywhere on it.
1. Accept that this is the real question
Clients ask about sector specialism and process, and they are being polite. What they want to know is what happens when it goes wrong, because they have all had it go wrong.
2. Put the terms on the website
Not in the terms of business sent after agreement. On a page, in plain language, where somebody deciding whether to contact you can read it.
3. Explain the sliding scale properly
A full refund in week one reducing over a defined period is standard and reasonable. Left unexplained it reads as a trick, and the explanation takes two sentences.
4. State the trigger conditions clearly
Resignation, dismissal for cause, redundancy and mutual agreement are different situations. Saying which are covered prevents the argument that makes a client tell everybody about you.
5. Say what voids the guarantee
Late payment, a changed role, an unrecorded start date. These exclusions are usually fair and always look terrible when produced after a departure rather than before a signature.
6. Offer replacement and refund as a choice
Some clients need the seat filled and some need the money back. Insisting on replacement to protect your revenue is visible and clients recognise it.
7. Define the replacement window
How long you have to produce somebody, what happens if you cannot and whether the guarantee resets on a replacement hire. That last point is the one clients discover too late.
8. Explain who owns a counter offer situation
Somebody leaving in week three for a counter offer from their previous employer is a different failure from a bad match, and stating your position prevents a dispute later.
9. Deal with the contract and temp equivalent
Rebates on permanent placements are familiar. What happens when a contractor disappears in week two needs its own paragraph, because the mechanics are different.
10. Publish a typical timeline for settlement
Clients fear a refund that takes two quarters. Saying how quickly a credit or payment is issued is a competitive advantage that costs you nothing if you already do it properly.
11. Use the terms to justify your fee
An agency with a longer guarantee and a higher fee has an argument to make, and the argument only works if both numbers are visible at the same time.
12. Keep candidate data handling consistent with it
Clients evaluating your professionalism read every policy page, and the standards described in candidate questions about how their data is used are part of the same impression.
13. Do not let the two audiences collide
Candidates reading rebate terms written for employers get the wrong idea, which is the separation problem set out in candidates and clients using the same inbox.
13b. Say what you do before a rebate is needed
Check in calls in the first fortnight, a conversation with the line manager, an early warning when somebody is unsettled. A guarantee is what happens after failure, and clients are more impressed by what you do to prevent it.
14. Borrow the structure from other refund pages
The clarity that works on a course refund page works here too, and the structure in refund window and completion questions on course pages transfers directly.
15. Answer it when the client is reading
Hiring decisions get reviewed in the evening after the day's interviews. An assistant that states the rebate structure, explains the sliding scale, asks what role is being filled and takes the details for a call your team confirms captures a client who was otherwise going to ask three agencies the same question tomorrow, which continues the pattern in how recruitment agencies engage candidates out of hours.
16. Run the numbers on it
A single recovered client relationship usually covers the cost several times, and the chatbot ROI calculator gives you the figure. Plans are on pricing, and the sector view sits under recruitment agencies.