Staffing / recruiting agency / headhunter software, built around E&O and job order ↔ candidate submission board

Arkathos gives a staffing a workspace tailored to how the work actually runs — This workspace is built around filling client job orders with the right candidates — a two-sided sourcing-to-placement pipeline billed on bill-rate markup or a placement fee. Arkathos tailors a staffing workspace around 5 agents: Sentinel, Treasury, Marshall, Quartermaster, Herald.

Compliance a staffing can't afford to miss

Watchtower tracks every license, bond, insurance policy, and continuing-education requirement for a staffing, with renewal cadences and staged reminders so nothing lapses.

• A staffing must maintain a Employment agency license (state/local), through the State or local licensing authority (e.g., NYC Dept. of Consumer & Worker Protection; NJ Division of Consumer Affairs - Employment & Personnel Services; PA Dept. of Labor & Industry), which renews every two years.
• A staffing must maintain a General business license, which renews every year.
• A staffing must maintain a Employment agency surety bond, through the Surety carrier; filed with the state/local employment-agency licensing authority, which renews every year.
• A staffing must maintain a Employment / staffing agency license, through the State Dept of Labor / Consumer Affairs, which renews every year.
• A staffing must maintain a Temporary help / day-and-temporary-labor service agency registration, through the State labor department (e.g., Illinois Dept. of Labor; NJ Division of Consumer Affairs - Temporary Help Service Firm), which renews every year.
• A staffing must maintain a Certified Staffing Professional (CSP), through the American Staffing Association (ASA), which renews every 3 years.
• A staffing must maintain a State employer / SUTA unemployment registration, through the State Dept of Labor (Unemployment Insurance), which has no fixed renewal cycle.
• The Certified Staffing Professional (CSP) carries a continuing-education requirement of 30 hours every 36 months (6h Employment law, 24h General staffing/recruiting).
• A staffing must maintain a E-Verify enrollment (employment eligibility), through the USCIS / DHS E-Verify, which has no fixed renewal cycle.
• A staffing must maintain a Certified Search Consultant (CSC), through the American Staffing Association (ASA), which renews every 3 years.
• The Certified Search Consultant (CSC) carries a continuing-education requirement of 30 hours every 36 months (6h Employment law, 24h General staffing/recruiting).
• A staffing must maintain a Certified Personnel Consultant (CPC), through the National Association of Personnel Services (NAPS), which renews every year.
• A staffing must maintain a Professional liability / Errors & Omissions insurance, which renews every year.
• The Certified Personnel Consultant (CPC) carries a continuing-education requirement of 20 hours per year (17h NAPS-approved content, 3h General (any approved source)).
• A staffing must maintain a Health Care Staffing Services (HCSS) Certification, through the The Joint Commission, which renews every two years.
• A staffing must maintain a Professional liability / Errors & Omissions (E&O) insurance, through the Private insurance carrier, which renews every year.
• A staffing must maintain a Employment Practices Liability Insurance (EPLI), through the Private insurance carrier, which renews every year.
• A staffing must maintain a General liability insurance, through the Private insurance carrier, which renews every year.
• A staffing must maintain a Workers' compensation insurance, through the State-regulated workers' compensation carrier / state fund, which renews every year.
• A staffing must maintain a Cyber liability insurance, through the Private insurance carrier, which renews every year.

Everything Arkathos runs for a staffing

These are the agents set up first for a staffing — and because it's one platform, every plan includes all 16 Arkathos agents. Also included whenever you need them: Guardhouse, Scribe, Courier, War Room, Armory, Mint Warden, Vault Keeper, Watchtower, Bulletin Board, Client Portal.

• Sentinel — Contact & lead management, Deal / estimate pipeline, Task & follow-up tracking, SMS & email outreach, Pipeline reporting.
• Treasury — Invoicing & payment collection, Expense tracking, Accounting & bookkeeping, Business tax prep & filing, Recurring billing & subscriptions, Financial dashboards & reports.
• Marshall — Payroll runs, Employee & HR records, Tax withholding & filings, Time & PTO tracking.
• Quartermaster — Online booking & appointments, Calendar & availability, Events & waitlists, Automated reminders, Job dispatch & scheduling.
• Herald — SEO & get-found content, Social media scheduling, Email & newsletter campaigns, Brand voice & content studio, Review & reputation growth, AI-overview & directory visibility.

Your tailored staffing workspace

These are net-new, staffing-specific capabilities — not a generic CRM bolted onto your industry.

• Job order ↔ candidate submission board (Sentinel): Two-sided pipeline: client-side job-order/req objects (role, pay rate, bill rate, # openings, target start) and candidate objects joined by a submission record that moves sourced → screened → submitted → interview → offer → placed. Sentinel today only has a generic deals/contacts pipeline with no req-to-candidate matching or per-submission stage tracking.
• Bill-rate vs pay-rate margin engine (Treasury): Per placement, capture bill rate, pay rate, and burden (employer taxes, workers' comp, benefits) to compute gross-margin % and spread per hour; roll approved hours into the client invoice at bill rate and into temp payroll at pay rate from one source. Current invoices have no bill/pay spread model.
• Placement-fee invoicing with fall-off guarantee (Treasury): Direct-hire/headhunt billing = % of first-year salary with a guarantee window (e.g. 30/60/90-day) that auto-prorates a refund/credit if the hire leaves, plus a temp-to-perm conversion fee schedule that decays as the temp accrues hours. Treasury invoices are flat one-offs today.
• Timesheet → approval → dual posting (Marshall): Temp logs hours against a specific client/job-site assignment; the client manager approves the timesheet; approved hours post simultaneously to the client invoice (bill rate) and temp payroll (pay rate). Timesheets, invoices, and payroll are unlinked today.
• Placement compliance packet (I-9 / E-Verify / FCRA) (Marshall): Per-placement onboarding checklist enforcing I-9 + E-Verify result, FCRA-compliant background-check and drug-screen order/result with the adverse-action workflow, and ban-the-box gating, all with document-expiry reminders. The Onboarding tab is generic today.
• Candidate self-scheduling links (Quartermaster): Send candidates a link to self-book an interview or screen into a recruiter's (or hiring manager's) open availability, with automated reminders and reschedule handling to cut no-shows during high-volume sourcing.
• Bench / redeployment tracker (Sentinel): Flag each temp as on-assignment vs available-on-bench with assignment end-dates, and auto-surface redeployment candidates as assignments wind down so recruiters refill billable hours before they lapse.
• Specialty-desk credential vault (Marshall): For healthcare/allied/nurse desks: store license #, primary-source verification status, and certification expiries per candidate with a Joint Commission staffing-file checklist; block submitting a candidate whose credentials are expired.
• Multi-state SUTA + ACA ALE tracker (Treasury): As temps are placed across state lines, track SUTA registration + experience rate per state and alert when a placement in a new state triggers registration; accrue ACA applicable-large-employer hours across the temp pool so large desks meet 1095-C obligations.

The agents and tabs you get

Sentinel for a staffing surfaces Overview, Contacts, Tasks, Chat. Treasury for a staffing surfaces Financial sheet, Invoices, Transactions, Payroll calc, Filings, Chat. Marshall for a staffing surfaces Employees, Onboarding, Time tracking, Payroll, Kiosk, Chat. Quartermaster for a staffing surfaces Calendar, Bookings, Availability, Events, Chat. Herald for a staffing surfaces Brand voice, Compose, Schedule, Get found, Ads, ✦Studio, Chat.

Frequently asked questions

best recruiting software for a small staffing agency

Agency-built ATS+CRM tools (Recruit CRM, Recruiterflow, Manatal, Zoho Recruit) top most lists. Arkathos bundles CRM, scheduling, payroll, invoicing and marketing in one flat-priced platform tailored to staffing, with no per-seat fees.

how much does staffing agency software cost per user

Most bill per user monthly, roughly $15 to $165 a seat (Manatal ~$15, Bullhorn ~$99 to $165), plus setup and back-office fees. Arkathos uses flat pricing with no per-seat charges, so cost doesn't scale with recruiters.

do i need both an ats and a crm for my recruiting agency

Yes. Agencies run a two-sided business (candidates and clients), so you need both, ideally as one data model to avoid silos. Arkathos combines candidate CRM and client pipeline in a single platform.

how to start a staffing agency

Pick a niche, write a business plan, register the business and get an EIN, handle licensing, insurance and payroll funding, then build a candidate pipeline before landing clients. Startup costs commonly run about $18k to $92k.

how much should a staffing agency charge markup on bill rate

Temp markups typically run 30% to 75% over pay rate (healthcare 100%+); direct-hire fees are about 15% to 30% of first-year salary. Markup must cover FICA, unemployment and workers' comp before any profit.

how do staffing agencies handle payroll for temp workers 1099 vs w2

For W-2 temps the agency is employer of record and pays FICA, FUTA/SUTA and workers' comp; 1099 contractors handle their own taxes. Misclassification risks fines. Arkathos runs payroll and tracks worker classification.

staffing agency back office software for timesheets and invoicing

Back-office tools capture temp timesheets, run pay cycles, and auto-generate client invoices from bill rates (TempWorks, Zoho Workerly, DATABASICS). Arkathos links scheduling, timesheets, payroll and invoicing so approved hours flow straight to billing.

i-9 compliance requirements for staffing agencies

As employer of record the agency completes Form I-9 (Section 2 within 3 business days of work starting) and retains it three years after hire or one year after termination, whichever is later.

best ai tools to source candidates faster

AI sourcing tools (Fetcher, Gem, Pin, Manatal) parse resumes and semantically match skills, cutting sourcing time up to ~60% versus keyword search, then rank candidates by fit so recruiters spend time on outreach.

What licenses and insurance does a staffing need?

Arkathos tracks 17 items for a staffing, including Employment agency license (state/local), General business license, Employment / staffing agency license, Temporary help / day-and-temporary-labor service agency registration. Each renewal and expiration is monitored in Watchtower with staged reminders.

What continuing education is required for a staffing?

The Certified Staffing Professional (CSP) carries a continuing-education requirement of 30 hours every 36 months (6h Employment law, 24h General staffing/recruiting). The Certified Search Consultant (CSC) carries a continuing-education requirement of 30 hours every 36 months (6h Employment law, 24h General staffing/recruiting). The Certified Personnel Consultant (CPC) carries a continuing-education requirement of 20 hours per year (17h NAPS-approved content, 3h General (any approved source)). Watchtower logs hours by category and flags shortfalls before the deadline.

Which Arkathos agents does a staffing get?

Arkathos tailors a staffing workspace around 5 agents: Sentinel, Treasury, Marshall, Quartermaster, Herald.

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