Placement fee and rebate calculator.
Your fee, the VAT, and what you'd owe back if the candidate leaves in week three or week eleven. Use our sliding scale or type in your own terms.
Rebate scale
Don't know the week? Enter their start and leaving dates.
How it works.
The fee is your percentage of the first-year salary, plus anything else your terms include, such as a guaranteed bonus. VAT is added at 20% if you're VAT-registered.
The default scale is the sliding one many UK agencies use: all of the fee back if the candidate leaves in the first two weeks, then 80%, 60%, 40%, 20% and 10% for each two weeks after, and nothing from week 13. It's the scale quoted in Euro London Appointments v Claessens [2006] EWCA Civ 385. Your terms win: choose "My own terms" and type in your bands.
Week 1 is the candidate's first seven days, counting their start date as day 1. A refund usually goes out as a credit note, with VAT on it if the original invoice carried VAT.
Some agencies offer a free replacement instead of money back. If yours does, the table still shows what the replacement is worth.
A guide, not legal advice. It applies the rules as written to the dates and figures you enter. Your own terms and the facts of a case can change the answer; if money or a dispute turns on it, check with an employment lawyer.
Rules as of 21 October 2026
When the rules change.
Rates and thresholds move most Aprils. Leave your email and we'll tell you when this tool is updated. We won't use it for anything else, and you can ask us to delete it at hello@hikari-ai.co.uk.
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