With employment mediation, such as recruitment and selection, an agency brings you and a candidate together and you sign the employment contract yourself. With temp work or making a worker available, the worker stays employed by the agency, which makes the person available to you for a fee to work under your supervision and direction [1]. Hiring yourself mainly costs time. Which form fits depends on what you need: your own employee or temporary capacity without your own employment relationship.
What is the legal difference?
The Dutch Labour Authority explains it like this [1]:
- Employment mediation: the intermediary puts employer and worker in touch to bring about an employment contract between the two. You are the employer.
- Temp work or making available: no employment contract is concluded between you as the hirer and the worker. The worker is employed by the agency and is also paid by the agency.
Hiring, temp work and mediation all fall under the Act on the allocation of workers by intermediaries (Waadi) [1]. If you hire temporary staff through secondment, temp work or payrolling, the worker isn't employed by you, different rules apply (for example on notice periods) and you must check that the company you hire from is registered in the KVK Trade Register (the Waadi check); you can be fined if it isn't [2]. A temp worker is entitled to the same working conditions, such as pay and other allowances, as an employee of the hirer in an equal or equivalent job [3].
There's also a practical difference: if you employ the worker yourself, you must keep a copy of the identity document; for hired-in staff you may not keep a copy (except for staff from outside the EEA or Switzerland), but you must check the identity document [4].
What are the options side by side?
- Hiring yourself: you choose your own channels and do selection and interviews yourself. You pay no agency but invest your own time. You sign the contract.
- Recruitment and selection: an agency searches and selects, you choose and sign the contract. Ask in advance about costs, what happens if the match turns out not to work and how the agency handles candidate data.
- Temp work, secondment or payrolling: the worker is employed by the agency and you pay a rate. This suits temporary capacity without your own employment relationship [2].
- Freelance: you must avoid false self-employment [2]. For structural work under your direction this usually doesn't fit; see our article on freelance or working student.
What suits a working student?
As a rule you'll want to employ a working student yourself, with your own employment contract that takes the studies into account. Then hiring yourself or recruitment and selection fit, not temp work. Temp work for students exists too; it depends on whether you want to retain an employee or only need temporary capacity.
How does it work at VOIDS?
According to our website, after an intake we take the recruitment process off your hands and you choose from a pre-selected shortlist. There are two fee structures: one fee only on a successful placement, or a fixed monthly amount with replacement included as soon as a working student stops [5]. Under our general terms VOIDS works on a best-efforts basis and the client remains responsible for the hiring decision; in recruitment, VOIDS and the client each act as independent controllers of candidate data [6]. Read the terms of any agency before you sign.
Sources
- Nederlandse Arbeidsinspectie: Inhuren en uitlenen van arbeidskrachten (Wet allocatie arbeidskrachten door intermediairs), accessed 11 October 2026.
- Ondernemersplein (Rijksoverheid): U heeft personeelstekort of tijdelijk veel werk, accessed 11 October 2026.
- Nederlandse Arbeidsinspectie: Gelijke behandeling (ter beschikking gestelde arbeidskrachten), accessed 11 October 2026.
- Ondernemersplein (Rijksoverheid): ID-bewijs controleren en bewaren, accessed 11 October 2026.
- VOIDS: Werving & selectie (incl. cases), accessed 11 October 2026.
- VOIDS: Algemene voorwaarden, accessed 11 October 2026.
Transparency: VOIDS connects working students with organisations and therefore has an interest in this topic. We back up facts with sources and connect research and trends to our own experience from practice.
