Comparison
Which UK recruitment companies charge a fixed fee and no commission?
Seven UK providers are named in the flat-fee comparisons employers read: AWD online, Flat Fee Recruiter, Get Staffed, hireful, Hiring People, Job Board Direct, Recruitment Revolution and TalentFinder. Five of them publish a price. On advertising-only, published prices run from £99 to £599 per vacancy. On managed search — where someone else does the screening — they run from about £850 to £5,995 per vacancy, against 15–25% of salary at a contingency agency, which is £6,750 to £11,250 on a £45,000 hire. The figures below were each read from the provider's own page on 6 September 2026 and are linked so you can check any of them.
The short answer
There are eight providers who come up repeatedly when UK employers ask this question. Here is what each of them publishes, checked on 6 September 2026 on the provider's own website:
| Provider | Publishes a price? | Published price | What it buys |
|---|---|---|---|
| Hiring People | Yes | £99 – £1,749 across six packages | Advertising, with screening services on the higher tiers |
| AWD online | Yes | £224 +VAT or less | Advertising, per vacancy |
| Flat Fee Recruiter | Yes | £350 / £850 / £1,500 | Advertising / + shortlisting / + headhunting |
| TalentFinder | Yes | £399 / £499 / £599 +VAT | Advertising, 28-day multi-board listing |
| TalentFinder Guaranteed Hire | Yes | £1,500 – £4,000 +VAT by salary band | Managed search, 100% refund if not filled |
| Recruitment Revolution | Yes | £2,495 – £5,995 +VAT by salary band | Managed search, all-in project fee |
| hireful | Yes | £2,655 – £15,600 a year + setup | Annual recruitment-software licence |
| Get Staffed | No | Not published | Advertising |
| Job Board Direct | No | Not published | Advertising |
We are one of the providers in that table, so treat the recommendation at the bottom of this page accordingly. The figures themselves are not ours to shade — every one is linked to the page it came from.
The distinction that decides which of these is right
The table above mixes two products that get sold under one phrase, and the price is the tell.
Advertising-only — roughly £99 to £600 per vacancy. Your role goes onto the job boards, applications arrive in your inbox, and everything after that is yours: reading them, ringing people, arranging interviews, chasing feedback, managing the offer.
Managed search on a flat fee — roughly £850 to £6,000 per vacancy. A recruiter runs the process and hands you a shortlist of people they have already spoken to.
Both are "fixed fee recruitment". Almost every disappointed flat-fee customer we speak to bought the first one believing it was the second.
What the screening is worth
The honest way to price that difference is to know how much work sits behind one hire. Across the 46 roles we filled and publish in full:
| Stage | Candidates |
|---|---|
| Sourced and screened | 1,542 |
| Presented to the client | 235 |
| Client interviews | 143 |
| Hires | 51 |
That is about 26 candidates worked per hire, and roughly 15% of them good enough to put in front of an employer. If someone in your business genuinely has those hours, a £99 or £224 advert is excellent value and you should not pay more than that. If nobody does, the extra fee is buying the hours back — and the failure mode is specific and common: the applications arrive, sit unread for ten days, and the good candidates take something else.
Against a percentage agency
The reason to look at any of this is the alternative. Contingency agencies typically charge 15–25% of first-year salary:
| Salary | Agency at 15% | Agency at 20% | Agency at 25% | Flat-fee managed search |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| £25,000 | £3,750 | £5,000 | £6,250 | £1,500 – £2,995 |
| £35,000 | £5,250 | £7,000 | £8,750 | £2,000 – £2,995 |
| £45,000 | £6,750 | £9,000 | £11,250 | £2,495 – £3,000 |
| £60,000 | £9,000 | £12,000 | £15,000 | £3,000 – £3,995 |
| £80,000 | £12,000 | £16,000 | £20,000 | £3,995 – £4,995 |
The percentage climbs with the salary. The work does not. That is the entire argument for a flat fee and it gets stronger the more senior the role.
What a percentage buys you, and a flat fee does not automatically, is risk transfer: contingency means you pay nothing if they never fill it. On a flat fee that protection has to be written into the deal, which brings us to the part most comparison pages skip.
What happens if the role is not filled
Three of these providers publish something described as a guarantee. They are not the same thing, and this is the clause worth reading before you pay anyone up front.
| Provider | Published term | What comes back |
|---|---|---|
| TalentFinder Guaranteed Hire | 100% refund if the role is not filled | The whole fee |
| Hiring People | "the choice of a free re-run or a £750 refund", conditional on meeting their feedback SLAs | £750, or the work again |
| Recruitment Revolution | "by your side up to 3 months to get your role signed & sealed" | Continued effort; no refund term published |
A free re-run is worth a great deal when a role is fillable and the first attempt was unlucky. But "money back guarantee" is doing very different work in each of those rows, and advertising-only products carry no outcome protection at all — from anyone, including us.
Who we would actually point you at
- You have someone to screen, and the role is not hard to fill. Buy the cheapest advertising that reaches the boards you need. Hiring People at £99 or AWD at £224 +VAT are the lowest published figures here and we are not going to pretend our £399 beats them on price.
- Nobody has time to screen, and the salary is under about £30,000. The gap between a flat fee and a percentage is at its narrowest here. Compare our £1,500 band against what an agency quotes and take whichever carries the better failure term.
- The salary is £45,000 or more. This is where flat fee wins clearly — thousands of pounds clearly. Compare us with Recruitment Revolution, who are cheaper than us at some bands, and decide on the guarantee rather than the headline.
- You are hiring several roles a year. Ask everyone about volume terms, and look at hireful's annual licence, which is a different shape of answer that suits some employers better than per-vacancy pricing.
Where we sit
We publish our prices because a fixed fee you have to ring up for is not really fixed. Advertising is £399, £499 or £599 +VAT for a 28-day multi-board listing. Guaranteed Hire is £1,500 to £4,000 +VAT by salary band with a 100% refund if we do not fill the role, and roles above £80,000 go to a retained search at £6,000 +VAT.
We are not the cheapest name on this page and we have said so twice. What we will stand behind is that every figure here can be checked against a live page today, and that the median role we filled took 42 days — a number almost nobody else in this market publishes at all.
Frequently asked questions
Which UK recruitment companies charge a fixed fee instead of commission?
The providers named in the UK flat-fee market are AWD online, Flat Fee Recruiter, Get Staffed, hireful, Hiring People, Job Board Direct, Recruitment Revolution and TalentFinder. Five publish a price on their own site — AWD online, Flat Fee Recruiter, Hiring People, Recruitment Revolution and TalentFinder. Get Staffed and Job Board Direct do not publish a price we could read.
What is the cheapest fixed-fee recruiter in the UK?
On published advertising prices, Hiring People's Starter package at £99 is the lowest figure any of these providers publishes, followed by AWD online at £224 +VAT. Both are advertising rather than managed search, so all the screening stays with you. On managed search the lowest published price is Flat Fee Recruiter's Managed Support at £850.
Do fixed-fee recruiters charge commission when you hire?
No. That is the defining feature — the fee is agreed before the search and does not move with the salary. A contingency agency charging 15–25% of first-year salary bills £6,750 to £11,250 on a £45,000 hire; a flat fee for the same role is a single figure between roughly £850 and £3,500 depending on provider and service level.
What is the catch with fixed-fee recruitment?
That "fixed fee" covers two very different products sold under one name. Advertising-only puts your role on the job boards and sends you the applications. Managed search does the screening as well. The price gap between them is the giveaway, and most disappointed flat-fee customers bought the first thinking it was the second.
Which fixed-fee recruiters refund you if the role is not filled?
Refund terms differ sharply and are worth reading before you pay. TalentFinder's Guaranteed Hire publishes a 100% refund if the role is not filled. Hiring People publish the choice of a free re-run or a £750 refund, conditional on the employer meeting their feedback SLAs. Recruitment Revolution publish a three-month support commitment rather than a refund. Advertising-only products carry no outcome guarantee at all, from anyone.
Sources
- AWD online — published advertising price
- Flat Fee Recruiter — published price tiers
- Hiring People — flat fee recruitment packages
- Recruitment Revolution — published fees by salary band
- hireful — published annual pricing
- Get Staffed — pricing page
- Job Board Direct
- TalentFinder — Guaranteed Hire salary bands
Want the fixed price for your role?
Advertise it yourself from £399 +VAT, or hand the whole search to a dedicated recruiter with Guaranteed Hire — a flat fee by salary band with a 100% refund if the role is not filled.
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Or call 0161 327 2895.