According to a new survey, IT recruitment consultants are letting down both companies and candidates when it comes to service.

The survey, conducted by the HW Group, compared the opinions of both recruiters and job seekers in the IT, financial and legal sectors. Among IT directors and human resources professionals, only nine per cent said that the service they received was 'very good', as opposed to 15 per cent of finance directors and 13 per cent of recruitment partners in law firms.

Eighteen per cent said that the service they received was poor, in comparison to only five per cent of the accountants and eight per cent of the lawyers.

Among those looking for a job in IT, 17 per cent stated that the service they had received was either 'good' or 'very good', while nearly a third of the accountants and lawyers questioned who had used a recruitment agency, felt this way. Fifteen per cent said that service was poor, in comparison to only seven per cent of the financial and eight per cent of the legal job seekers.

The most common complaint of both candidates and corporate recruiters was the lack of a personal approach by consultants. Face-to-face interviews and the provisions of career guidance, which appeared to be the norm for candidates in the legal and accountancy sectors were rare in IT. "One of the consultants I deal with always gets my name wrong," said one disgruntled contractor, "but he never seems to have a problem remembering how much I am getting paid down to the last penny."

Visiting client premises to gain an understanding of corporate culture was also far from commonplace in the IT sector, yet appeared a basic requirement in both the law and accountancy sectors. "How on earth can you look for a key member of staff for a firm if you haven't met the people they will be working with?" asked a recruitment partner in a large law firm, who had been asked to recruit an IT professional. "I practically had to drag people from IT consultancies into the office, whereas the legal recruitment consultants I deal with will be round here at the drop of a hat."

"It's clear that many IT recruitment consultancies have been allowed to get away with a pretty slapdash service, a service that would be completely unacceptable to other disciplines and professions," says Richard Keynon, who organised the research in preparation for the launch this month of HW's Group's own IT recruitment arm, HW Group Technology. "We aim to make all these things standard for both contract and permanent appointments, as they are within the rest of the Group's operations and by doing so, stand the industry on its head."