How Many Travel Nursing Companies Should You Work With?

Many travel nurses wonder if they should work with more than one travel nursing agency to help them land their desired job. The simple answer is yes! In this article, we’ll review everything travel nurses need to know about working with multiple agencies.

What does it mean to “work with” multiple travel nursing agencies?

First, let’s define what it means to “work with” multiple travel nursing agencies. We do not mean that a travel nurse should work multiple assignments with multiple agencies at the same time. Instead, we mean that you should engage with multiple travel nursing agencies to help you land an assignment through one of them.

To accomplish this, you will seek out multiple travel nursing agencies that can help you land assignments in your desired locations. In doing so, you should establish contact with a recruiter that you love at each of these companies.

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Next, you’ll want to get your submission profile ready to go with each of the agencies. This is necessary to ensure that the agency can submit you quickly when a job you’re interested in opens.

Finally, you’ll want to establish some ground rules with each of the agencies you’re working with. Let them know what locations, shifts and other details you’re interested in. Also, you’ll want to establish rules for submitting your profile.

Why Should Travel Nurses Work With Multiple Agencies?

You’re probably wondering why you should go through all of this work. There are many great reasons that travel nurses should work with multiple agencies.

Maximize Your Access to the Travel Nursing Job Market

First, different agencies work with different hospitals and therefore have access to different jobs. As a result, working with more agencies maximizes your access to the job market.

For example, if you want to work in San Diego, California, then you might need to work with 3 to 4 different companies in order to have access to every job in that market.

Relationships Matter

Second, different companies have different levels of access to different hospitals. For example, one travel nursing company might have a better relationship with a hospital than another. As a result, the hospital is more likely to interview candidates from the agency they have a better a relationship with.

Bill Rate Variance

Third, different agencies can have different bill rates for the same hospital. This means one agency may be able to pay you more than another.

Negotiating Power

Fourth, working with multiple agencies improves a travel nurse’s negotiating power. The more options you have, the better your negotiating power will be. In negotiation speak, your options are often referred to as your “Best Alternative to a Negotiated Agreement.” You can discover more about this topic in our free eBook, “How to Negotiate the Best Travel Nursing Pay Packages.

Safety Net

Finally, working with multiple agencies provides a safety net should something go wrong with your current situation. Hospitals sometimes cancel travel nursing contracts. Also, agencies that seemed terrific to work with initially can end up disappointing you. In such cases, it’s essential to have backup plans ready to hit the ground running.

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What are the pitfalls and challenges of working with multiple travel nursing agencies?

As you can see, you’ll realize many great benefits when you work with multiple travel nursing agencies. However, there are also challenges and potential pitfalls you’ll need to manage.

How to manage documentation with multiple travel nursing agencies

First, many travel nurses express concern that it will be too difficult for them to manage their documentation with multiple travel nursing agencies. As we mentioned above, it’s best for you to keep your documents updated with each agency you work with. This includes your job application, skills checklists, and everything else. That’s a lot of documentation.

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Fortunately, BluePipes provides you with a free solution that solves this problem. With BluePipes, you can create a “universal profile”. It includes a job application, resume and skills checklists. You can also upload copies of licenses, certifications and clinical records.

You can conveniently share your profile in a number of different ways. Our universal travel nursing profile makes it easy for you to manage documentation with any number of travel nursing agencies.

How to manage communication with multiple travel nursing agencies

Similarly, many travel nurses express concern that they will get overwhelmed with inquiries from multiple travel nursing companies. If you’re careful, this should not be a problem.

The original Universal Profile and Credential Management for travelers.

First, avoid old school lead generation services that sell your contact information to anyone who will pay for it. Also, use burner phone numbers and email addresses at the outset and only provide your real contact information to the companies you decide to work closely with. For additional information, please review our article on how travel nurses can protect their privacy.

Submitted by multiple companies for the same job

The possibility of getting submitted by multiple agencies for the same job is another potential pitfall of working with multiple travel nursing agencies. That said, the entire industry greatly exaggerates the consequences of this.

Both recruiters and travelers routinely state that hospitals will remove you from consideration if multiple agencies submit your profile to the same job. While this is certainly possible, it is extremely rare. Moreover, you can easily avoid this with effective communication. Please read our article covering everything you need to know about getting submitted by multiple agencies to the same job for everything you need to know.

Speed to Market

It’s important to note that concerns over multiple submissions for the same job can end up hindering your speed to market. Lower speed to market can hinder your chances of landing jobs.

For example, if you require every recruiter to get your approval to submit you for new job openings as they open, then this may result in a delay in your recruiter actually submitting you. This delay can cost you the job. Yes, travel healthcare jobs can close that quickly, sometimes they close in under 1 hour.

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Again, this is where effective communication comes to the rescue. Please review our article on how you can manage the travel nursing job submission process for everything you need to know about this topic.

Hurting Feelings and Burning Bridges

Many travel nurses express concern about hurting their recruiters’ feelings if the travel nurse accepts an assignment with a different recruiter. Similarly, travel nurses express concern that they will be burning bridges with agencies and recruiters if they accept jobs with different agencies.

It’s true that both of these things can happen. However, the industry generally frowns upon this behavior. The vast majority of recruiters and agencies expect travel nurses to work with multiple agencies and recruiters. Moreover, if an agency or recruiter exhibits this behavior, then they might not be a good fit for you.

That said, it’s important for travel nurses to be open and honest with their recruiters. Please do not string them along. For example, please do not accept a job and then refuse it later because something better came up. Doing so would give the recruiter and agency good cause to be upset.

When Travel Nursing Agencies Push Back

Despite the fact that all parties in the travel nursing industry widely accept and even encourage the practice of travel nurses working with multiple agencies, some travel nursing agencies and recruiters will still push for the travel nurses they work with to work exclusively with them. They may even offer compelling arguments for this.

However, no matter how you slice it, such demands are more for the agency’s benefit than for the travel nurse’s benefit. We recommend travel nurses avoid such agencies and recruiters altogether.

How many travel nursing agencies should you work with?

So, with all of this in mind, how many travel nursing agencies should you work with? Well, we see many travel nurses on social media recommending that you work with 3 to 4 agencies. However, we conducted a survey in which only 53% of travel nurses reported working with 3 or more companies. 47% reported working with 1 or 2 agencies. Working with 1 agency was the single most popular response.

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This is great news for travel nursing agencies. Nearly 50% of their customer base is content relying strictly on them despite the fact that no single agency has access to all the jobs and the payrates may vary dramatically from agency to agency.

Our own recommendation is for travel nurses to work with as many agencies as they can. Of course, we have built a platform that helps travelers manage the most difficult aspects of working with multiple agencies.

Our travel nursing job board helps you find jobs much easier than legacy job boards. Our document management system helps you keep your documents updated with the companies you love. And our messaging system helps you communicate privately with companies until you’re ready to share your contact information with them.

No matter how you choose to manage it, you will benefit when you work with multiple travel nursing agencies to help you land jobs. You will increase your access to the job market. And, perhaps more importantly, you will get more money in the long run.

10 replies
  1. Torie Brummet says:

    how do travelers with multiple agencies handle benefits, specifically health insurance?

    • Kyle Schmidt says:

      Hey Tori,

      Thanks for the inquiry. Agencies only provide health insurance when you start an assignment with them. Technically, they can terminate the benefits when your assignment with them ends. Of course, you may sign on for another contract with the same agency, in which case your health benefits would continue on as normal.

      You may also have a break in between assignments with the same agency. Most agencies have a grace period where they’ll continue covering your health benefits even though you’re technically not working. You should always inquire about an agency’s policy for this and know that if the break in between assignments is longer than one month, then your benefits will most likely be terminated and started back up once your next assignment starts. Of course, you always have the option of using COBRA in such cases, which essentially means that you’re able to pay for the same insurance policy in order to maintain coverage.

      If you switch agencies, then you’ll most likely switch benefits. It’s just like switching jobs normally. Again, you’re eligible for COBRA coverage during any downtime. The problem is that switching health insurance can have some negative aspects. For example, your particular medication might not be covered under the new plan.

      If the problems associated with switching coverage are important to you, then there a re a couple of things to consider. First, many travel nurses secure their own health coverage in order to avoid this problem altogether. Many healthcare staffing companies will increase your pay if they don’t need to provide health insurance, so it’s often a wash in terms of cost.

      Second, the reasons for working with multiple companies may be worth dealing with the problems associated with switching health coverage. Working with multiple companies increases your access to the job market because different companies have contracts with different hospitals. This is really important because the most costly aspect of travel nursing is unanticipated downtime. Missing an extra week or two of work because the only agency your work with couldn’t land you a job costs several thousand dollars. Working with multiple companies can also increase your negotiating power. By having alternatives, you’ll be in a better position to negotiate.

      Finally, it’s important to point out that when people recommend “working with multiple agencies”, they really mean to enlist multiple agencies in helping you find jobs. You may actually end up working with only one agency because you keep signing contracts with the same agency. The other agencies simply ensure that you have your bases covered if something goes awry. The most common scenario is for a travel nurse to work a few assignments with one agency and then a few with another. The average time with each agency might be 8 months to 1 year.

      I hope this helps!

  2. Kathy says:

    Can you start at one hospital with one agency and 4 weeks later work at another hospital with another agency until the first contract end out(I will be working 6 days a week for 9weeks)? They are both good opportunities.

    • Kyle Schmidt says:

      Thanks for the inquiry, Kathy. Yes, it’s possible. However, it’s pretty rare to find two hospitals that are willing to provide the set schedules or flexible schedules required to pull it off. It never hurts to ask though!

  3. Tess says:

    So how do I handle a call for a job that I submitted for with two different agencies. Do you tell both recruiters that you are talking to the manager and whichever can get you the best rate?

    • Kyle Schmidt says:

      Thanks for the inquiry, Tess! As discussed in the article, how you approach this situation depends on several factors. First, it’s important to find out what the hospital’s policy is. They may have a first-come-first-serve policy, or they may let you decide which agency you want to work with, or they may have another policy. This is why it’s always safest to figure out the pay prior to being submitted and choose which company can submit you should a job open at the facility in question.

      That said, assuming that the hospital allows you to choose which agency you’ll work with, then you should certainly request a quote from both companies and compare those quotes. There is debate among negotiation experts as to whether or not it’s a good idea to pit one company against another in bidding war during compensation negotiations. So you’ll have to decide what works best for you on that issue. Here is a link to an article with negotiating tips that might help.

  4. Jill says:

    I have been told by recruiter X that the hospital says it looks bad on the Nurse if they are submitted to the same job opportunity by several agencies and it’s best if they just stick with one agency.

    • Kyle Schmidt says:

      Thanks for sharing this, Jill! Yes, recruiters say this all the time for several reasons. First, a very small percentage of hospitals do take this approach, but it’s nothing to really worry about. This is because duplicate submissions happen so often that hospitals would be excluding a decent percentage of candidates. Second, the recruiter may have been told this by someone they consider to be reputable and therefore they believe it’s true for all hospitals. Third, this is a common tactic used to scare travelers away from working with other agencies.

      The truth is that different hospitals have different rules for handling candidates being submitted by multiple agencies. Some hospitals simply ask the nurse which agency they want to work with. Some require the nurse to work through the first agency to submit the profile. And very few hospitals discard the profile. The latter two reasons make it very important from the nurse’s vantage point for the agency to get the nurse’s permission before submitting.

      The best way to handle this is to let the recruiter know that this is why they must receive your permission before ever submitting your profile for a job. Explain that if every recruiter you work with got your permission before submitting your profile, then this would never be a problem. You may even go so far as to let them know that submitting your profile for a job without first receiving your permission is a fireable-offense. Many experienced travelers take this approach because they realize how important it is for financial reasons.

      The only downside is that there may be a delay to get your profile submitted while your recruiter contacts you to get your approval. To handle this, you can ask to discuss potential pay packages for all the hospitals that the agency works with in the area you’re looking to travel. They should be able to discuss pay for some hospitals but for not for others because they’ll have the bill rates for some of them but not for others. Do this with each agency you work with and let the agencies know which one has the green-light to submit your profile when a position opens up and which ones don’t.

      I hope this helps!

    • Kyle Schmidt says:

      Thanks for the inquiry. BluePipes is an independent company. As a member, you can create your own resume, application and skills checklists and send them to any agency you’d like. We maintain a list of agencies that have contacted us to confirm they accept the documents. You can find it here.

      Members can also securely store copies of their licenses, certifications and clinical records on the site and send them to anyone at their convenience.

      We do not sell your personal contact information or access to your stored documents to third parties. Instead, agencies can only contact you through the site and they can only receive your documentation if you send it to them.

      I hope this answers your question, please let me know if not. Thanks, again!

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