Aston Carter

[boreddead]

Does anyone have any oppinions on Aston Carter (www.astoncarter.co.uk)?

Good or bad

Thanks

[Crossroads]

I tried to get a job through them once and these seemed OK to me at the time, although the job didn't materialise in a gig even to interview stage. They seemed quite candid about the reason. However, that was my experience, but it may not be yours. Usually, I don't encourage this bad apple/good apple syndrome by answering 'is this agency a good one?' questions. Mainly because we're not dealing with agencies, but EBs, and mainly because we're not dealing with bad or good apples either.

The problems the recruitment industry dump on us has little to do with individual EBs. You'll find that an EB that suits one person may not suit another, so asking is pretty useless really. It's rather like asking if sausage and mash is a good meal. If you like sausage and mash it is, if you are a vegetarian it's not, if you are on a diet it's not, if you hate mash but like sausages it partly is, if you are not in the mood for sausage and mash you aren't going to rave about it today, but might tomorrow....I think you get my drift.

Your experience may be very different than someone else's - depending on a number of factors: sales targets being met, the recruiter's own personality/mood/inclination to treat you OK when you get in touch/who the recruiter is/who the manager is/whether the policies are the same regarding candidate treatment. All these things will affect a candidate's perception of an EB at any one time and the overriding link that all these things have is the sales model that affects all EBs all the time. Therefore, no EB is really any better or worse than any other. They are all capable of giving tulipe to contractors and usually do in most cases.

It's only worth knowing whether they are solvent or not as this affects all contractors equally at a given time.

Excellent post, couldn't have put if better myself. I've had a working relationship for the past 6 years (on and off) with an agency with an awful reputation...however they have been first class for me.

[chicane]

Excellent post, couldn't have put if better myself. I've had a working relationship for the past 6 years (on and off) with an agency with an awful reputation...however they have been first class for me.

Likewise, my agent is from the dreaded XX bunch and despite many bad experiences with XX agents, this particular guy is (relatively) helpful and honest.

[mashetti]

Does anyone have any oppinions on Aston Carter (www.astoncarter.co.uk)?

Good or bad

Thanks

my last gig was through these geezers. invoices paid within 7 days so can't complain there. heard once from them in my first week and then nothing until close to renewal time but by then it was too late cos i'd lined up another gig. don't care that i didn't hear from them cos who wants a pesky wittle wabbit pimp bugging ya anyway. oh, and i got a beer bought for me but i think i deserved that (and a bit more actually ) as i got them into a new part of the client's business.

[abc]

I did an interview and didn't get the role. That's fine as tulip happens of course

But the agent from Aston Carter didn't even bother to let me know! He just left me hanging around.

Just after I did the interview, he had promised to get back in half an hour with a result. I was waiting in central London because he had suggested meeting for a coffee also. But what actually happened was, well, nothing.

The first time that I knew that it was a "NO" was when I saw the same role being advertised later by the same agent.

So I would not use them again. At least other agents get back to you.

[SoupDragon]

They offered my a permie position doing shell/perl scripts for an investment bank. Sound like a low key role - but is it worth it to get into investment banking??

[scribbler]

Any fresh opinions on Aston Carter. These ones might be a little stale.

[PropertyCrashUK]

I find it very annoying that when posts come available on their site or one of the job boards for my skills & my line of work I email/telephone them only to be told that they will get back to me - they never do - or that the post is filled within minutes of it going live on-line.

However, they email me and ring me up about roles which have nothing to do with my skill set, about roles I do not do and about skills which are not on my CV.

They keep contacting me about C# and Java roles when I am a TA.

I have concluded that it is pretty pointless even contacting them now about roles that come up that are what I do as I know I will get the cold shoulder.

If a role comes up that I do then I simply wait for it to appear with another agency.

Very disappointed with them IMPO.

[d000hg]

I've had sporadic contact with them the last couple of years, all for roles in banking, something on my CV evidently flags on their searches. I've not really been chasing things so they were contacting me but they nearly always sent me concrete job specs and named the client, and I don't think they ever asked for references, so I conclude they are on the level.
I have had them go silent when I've not achieved an interview but I don't really hold that against them, and to be fair they have generally responded after a bit of pushing.

My only gripe is person A never knows person B has already contacted me so I have had times I;ve been talking to 2 people about similar (but not the same) roles in the same company... maybe that's more a symptom of their clients being such big companies, I don't know.

[Ignis Fatuus]

In general your experience is determined by the agent, not the agency. Find good guys, keep in touch.