Agency workers & temp desks
Running a temp desk in 2026 means running the most regulated corner of recruitment — and the corner changing fastest. Here is the current state of play, in the order it hits your margins.
Sick pay changed in April — your rates should have too. Since 6 April 2026 Statutory Sick Pay starts on day one of sickness, and the lower earnings limit has gone. Workers who previously earned too little to qualify now qualify. That is a direct cost change on every temp book, and charge rates that were set before April and never revisited are quietly absorbing it. If you haven’t re-run the numbers since spring, do it this week.
Day-one rights are wider than many desks realise. Paternity leave and unpaid parental leave became day-one rights in April 2026. And from the first day of every assignment, agency workers are entitled under the Agency Workers Regulations to access the hirer’s collective facilities — canteen, childcare, transport — and information about the hirer’s vacancies. That is your obligation to police, not just the client’s.
The 12-week rule still anchors everything. After 12 weeks in the same role with the same hirer, an agency worker is entitled to the same basic working and employment conditions — pay, annual leave, rest breaks — as if the hirer had recruited them directly. The 12 weeks need not be consecutive: some breaks pause the clock, others continue it, and getting that arithmetic wrong is one of the most common failures inspectors find.
Key Information Documents are an inspection favourite. Every agency work-seeker must receive a KID before terms are agreed, including an honest illustration of take-home pay — especially where an umbrella company sits in the chain. If pay arrangements change, an updated KID must follow within five business days. The Fair Work Agency inherited this enforcement from the EAS, and a KID register with dates is exactly the kind of evidence it asks for.
And the big one is coming: guaranteed hours. Under the Employment Rights Act, agency workers are set to gain the right to guaranteed hours based on the hours they regularly work, reasonable notice of shifts, and payment for shifts cancelled at short notice — planned for 2027, with the consultation on how it will work closing 25 August 2026. This will reshape contracts, rates and client conversations on every temp desk in the country. Our ERA timeline tracks every date as it moves.
The pattern across all of it: the desks that thrive won’t be the ones that guessed well, but the ones that can show their working. Start with our free 12-point FWA compliance health check — and if you want the documents behind it, BIOR Agency Membership & Certification includes the compliance pack that covers this page end to end.