It’s my first time getting hired through a staffing agency and I’m not sure what to expect. I’m kind of nervous about the whole process. A recruiter from a staffing agency found my resume on indeed.com and called me saying there was an opportunity in my area for a tech position at a mail-order pharmacy if I was interested. It’s a contract-to-hire deal. I would be getting about $5 more per hour than what I currently get at the retail pharmacy I work at. For me, that’s a substantial pay raise. So, of course I said yes.

The staffing agency gave my resume to the mail-order pharmacy. The mail-order pharmacy said my resume looked great. I was offered the position without an interview since I'm technically still a trainee. When they tried to verify my certification I still show up as a trainee on the State Board of Pharmacy's website. I thought the lack of interview was weird, but I accepted the offer. I completed the paperwork and drug screening that was asked of me. Now I guess I’m just waiting for all the paperwork to go through. I was told I should give my current employer my 2 weeks’ notice on the 23rd. Which is this coming Monday. Start date is Nov. 6.

I thought a couple of other things were weird about the hiring process besides not having been formally interviewed. I got a call about the offer and we talked about it a bit, but I never got an email with the details about the position like I would normally get from recruiters who find my resume. I emailed the recruiter about it later, but he never responded.

There was a conference call with a bunch of other new-hires and another recruiter addressing us one by one setting up an appointment time to go into the staffing agency’s office and give 2 forms of ID for the I-9 form. I went at the scheduled time. No one seemed to be expecting me, not even the recruiter who was my point of contact. Even though I had an appointment, I had to explain why I was there. My recruiter apologized about the confusion. Sometimes things are “lost in translation” between their clients and themselves, and that they don’t always get the info they need to do their job.

Whatever. I let it slide. Stuff happens, right?

That also would’ve been the time I would complete my orientation, but all they did was give me an “orientation packet” I should read through detailing benefits, payroll, clocking in, etc.

I was also told that I needed to send either a picture or a copy of my diploma. Not my transcript. My diploma. Which is really weird to me. Is that normal? How do they verify the authenticity of my diploma? And if they do educational/background checks, why bother having me send a copy of it at all?

Honestly, if it wasn’t for the drug screening I had to do at the clinic, I would’ve thought the whole thing was a very impressive, elaborate scam to steal my personal info.

Maybe I’m just paranoid. I guess I just don’t know what’s normal for the onboarding process through a staffing agency. And it’s making me nervous. Does anyone have much experience with staffing agencies and how the hiring process works?