The Temporary employment agency industry consists of placement agencies that hire workers on temporary assignments, for their clients. The workers are supervised at work sites by their client companies. Agencies also supply workers for projects that are not permanent. The industry has developed in France in response to the increasing demand for flexibility in recruitment.

From the late 1960s, the sector grew rapidly within a gradually more permissive French regulatory framework, despite broad cultural, political and trade union opposition. The article uses a variegated capitalism conceptual framework to explain the contested growth of the sector, and identifies key players in this process, focusing in particular on large agencies’ role in constructing a market for agency labour.

Agence d’Intérim en France : Ce Qu’il Faut Savoir pour Recruter Rapidement

The tertiary sector, in particular information and communication technologies (ICT), is an important employer of temporary workers in Paris. Companies in this sector use temp workers to cope with staff shortages and to manage the peaks in activity linked to events, construction and tourism. Temporary work also allows companies to evaluate the skills of employees before hiring them permanently and to reshape their workforce based on current orders and projects.

To recruit employees from abroad, EuWorkers must submit a prior declaration of posting via the SIPSI platform (declaration préalable à l’emploi). If an employer fails to send this statement, they can be fined up to €4,000 per posted employee (or €8,000 in case of reoccurrence over two years) with a maximum limit of €500,000. They must also provide financial collateral, a guarantee taken out with a mutual or collective guarantee company, an insurance undertaking or a bank established in France and authorised to grant bonds.