VAR Staffing, a Richardson, Texas-based placement firm that helps IT providers find full-time and contract employees, is offering zero percent financing for its services through the end of the year.
Through an agreement with GreatAmerica Financial Services, of Cedar Rapids, Iowa, channel pros who work with VAR Staffing to fill their recruitment needs can pay the placement fee in 6 monthly installments rather than one lump sum without paying interest.
“The advantage of that to our clients is they’re not taking that one big hit to cash flow,” says Todd Billiar, VAR Staffing’s director of channel development.
The offer, announced at the Autotask Community Live event currently underway in Hollywood, Fla., is available to all VAR Staffing clients on approval of credit, and is contingent on the placement process wrapping up by December 31st.
VAR Staffing specializes in placing technicians, salespeople, and business development associates with resellers, managed service providers, and system integrators. The company typically charges a percentage of an employee’s first-year salary when filling technical roles and a flat fee when filling other positions. Billiar expects MSPs to find the opportunity to pay that charge in 6 installments on a same as cash basis especially attractive.
“Their cash flow is all based on a monthly [invoice],” he observes.
Greg VanDeWalker, senior vice president and general manager of GreatAmerica, predicts that eliminating the friction between recurring revenue streams and upfront placement fees will inspire at least some growing MSPs to add staff now rather than wait until they have more money in the bank.
“It really takes one of the big objections off the table,” he says.
According to Billiar, using VAR Staffing to find new employees saves channel partners time and reduces their chances of making bad hiring decisions by filtering out job candidates who lack the experience, people skills, and work habits to succeed in managed services.
“It’s like we did that first phone call and eliminated all the wrong [people],” he says, adding that only about 1 in 9 potential hires makes it all the way through the company’s vetting process.
Working with a professional recruiter like VAR Staffing can also help IT providers align compensation appropriately with market conditions and fine tune their job descriptions for maximum appeal, Billiar adds. That latter service is especially important right now because it’s a seller’s market for technical employees at present.
“Good talent is in extremely high demand,” he says.
VAR Staffing made GreatAmerica its partner for the new financing offer based on a long-standing relationship between the two companies and their similar client base.
“GreatAmerica works extensively in the IT channel, so their customers are my customers and vice versa,” Billiar says.
