Counter-offer
A counter-offer is what a candidate's current employer puts on the table after the candidate resigns to take a new job: usually more money, sometimes a promotion or a change of role. It is one of the most common reasons a placement falls through between acceptance and start date.
The window of risk runs from resignation to the first day in the new job, which on a three-month notice period is a long time. Employers counter because replacing someone is expensive and slow, and because a resignation is often the first time they learn the person was unhappy. A counter-offer can arrive on the day of resignation or weeks later, once the employer has worked out what losing the person will cost.
Good consultants prepare for it before the offer, not after. At the first conversation they ask why the candidate wants to move, and whether money would change their mind. If the answer to the second question is yes, the candidate is likely to accept a counter-offer, and the consultant knows that before spending weeks on the process. Before resignation, they rehearse with the candidate what they will say if their manager makes an offer.
A worked example. A candidate accepts a £65,000 role, a 20 per cent fee of £13,000, with a start date eight weeks away. Their employer matches the salary and adds a title. The candidate hesitates, stops returning calls for a week, and withdraws. The client has lost eight weeks and the agency has lost the fee, and often the client's confidence as well.
Candidates should be prepared for the resignation itself. A consultant who talks the candidate through what their manager is likely to say, and what they will answer, removes most of the surprise that makes a counter-offer land. It helps to remind them of the reasons they gave for moving at the start. Those reasons rarely change because the salary did, and candidates who accept a counter-offer often find that out within the year.
Where it goes wrong: the motivation to move was never tested; contact goes quiet after acceptance because the deal feels done; and nobody notices the candidate has stopped replying until they withdraw. Regular contact through the notice period, including a call soon after they resign, is the single most effective defence.
How Vayora handles it
Vayora watches the period after acceptance. Accepted offers with a start date still ahead are checked for silence and sentiment: no logged contact since acceptance, no contact for six days or more by default, or a last reply that read as negative. Those offers are scored and appear in an at-risk banner on the offers page, with extra weight when the start date is within a week. Offers themselves move through draft, approval, sent, accepted or declined, and a negotiating state when terms are reopened. Vayora cannot see a counter-offer being made; what it can do is tell you which candidates have gone quiet before you find out the hard way.
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