Many companies face the same question: should they bring in temporary staff, or hire new people through direct placement? The two are not the same – the cost structure is different, the responsibility is different, and they solve different problems. In this article we compare the two options from the employer’s point of view, for information purposes, and explain why we recommend direct placement to anyone who wants to fill their team for the long term.

Legal disclaimer: This article is for information only and does not constitute legal advice. For the specific legal requirements of employment, always consult the competent authority or an expert.

What is the difference, in short?

The most important difference between the two is who the worker’s employer is. This determines the costs, the responsibilities and also how long the worker stays with the team.

  • With temporary staffing, the worker remains an employee of the temporary staffing agency, and the host company merely hires them in. The agency pays the wages and contributions, but the company pays the agency an ongoing hourly fee – for as long as the worker is with them.
  • With direct placement, the agency finds and selects the right candidate, who then signs an employment contract directly with the company and becomes its own employee. The agency charges a one-off placement fee for this, after which the company only pays its own employee’s wages.

Costs over time

The costs of the two models develop very differently in the short and the long term. With temporary staffing, the company pays a permanent mark-up on every hour worked – and this mark-up recurs month after month, year after year, regardless of how long the person has been working there. Direct placement, by contrast, is a one-off investment: once the placement fee has been paid, the worker continues on the company’s own payroll, with no agency mark-up.

In other words, the longer a worker stays, the more direct placement pays off. Where the need for labour is lasting and long-term – as it typically is with the placement of Asian workers – direct placement usually pays for itself within a few months, and from then on works purely to the company’s advantage.

Loyalty and integration

Even more important than cost is the question of who the worker belongs to. An agency worker’s position is temporary by nature: they are not the company’s employee, they can easily be moved elsewhere, and they are less attached to the workplace. A worker hired through direct placement, on the other hand, becomes one of the company’s own people – a colleague like anyone else on the team. They become part of the company culture, learn its processes, and can be relied on for the long term.

This matters most where training takes time: if a worker leaves after six months, the effort invested in training them leaves too. A stable team built through direct placement prevents exactly this loss – we have written about staff retention in more detail in our article on retention and staff turnover.

Control and stability

When the worker is the company’s direct employee, the company itself directs their work, trains them, promotes them and plans with them for the long term – there is no shared responsibility with a third party. This means more transparent operations and a more predictable team. Direct placement is therefore not a one-off headcount top-up but genuine team building: it brings in colleagues who stay and grow with the company. For a good example of what this looks like in practice, see one of our case studies.

When is each the right choice?

Temporary staffing has its place too. If the need for labour really is temporary – a seasonal peak, a project lasting a few weeks, or covering a sudden, short-term absence – temporary staffing can be a flexible and quick solution, since headcount can easily be scaled up and down.

For most Hungarian companies, however, the labour problem is not temporary. A lasting, structural labour shortage – the very reason it makes sense to recruit from abroad at all – cannot be solved with temporary, agency-supplied headcount. What is needed then are people who stay for the long term and become part of the company. Direct placement is the right tool for this problem.

Why we recommend direct placement

Our service is built on direct placement because we are convinced that it is the real answer to a lasting labour shortage. The Asian – mainly Filipino – workers we place are motivated, reliable and well prepared for the job, and for a one-off fee the company strengthens its own long-term team with them.

The one real task direct placement leaves with the employer – that the worker becomes the company’s employee, together with the permits and onboarding – is precisely what our service covers. From registration through the permit applications to organising arrival and integration, we carry the bulk of the process, so the employer’s own administrative burden stays small and transparent.

In short: temporary staffing is the quick, short-term fix; direct placement is lasting, cost-effective team building. If you are planning for the long term, take a look at our services or get in touch – we will show you how to build a stable team with reliable Asian workers.

M. G. · 4 August 2026