Agent Fees

Why don't players pay their agent and not the clubs?
The agents have negotiated for the player with the club and covered any financial arrangements for the contract on behalf of the player?

Should player bonuses be paid at the end of the season?

Should all agents be on a retainer to be paid monthly, therefore making the agents responsible for keeping their client motivated for the term of the contract?

Should their payment be on a percentage of the player monthly wage including any earned bonuses?

In the normal world 99% of fans live in, we are all paid for effort against expectation as part of our employment.

i.e. A Sales person is be paid by their employer not the Client, any payment would on a commission and with a base salary, this is to keep the costs down and the Sales person focused and rewarded for their effort.

Lets not forget that in the real word many employers employ people from agencies whether on a temporary basis or a permanent basis and it is the agencies that get paid a "finders" fee.  This principle should also be taken on board with the agents rather than agents taking the large chunk of money, like they currently do!

If the club employs the agent then the club should pay, if the agent is employed by the player then the player should pay. Simples!!

"And I'm not paying Owt to any of them"   quote by Sir Darkside.

"My Pool boy & my Gardner just raised their prices....so that's it for another striker"   deleted quote from a recent Sky interview with Big Eddie.

Be good if that comment wasn't the complete opposite of the truth Terrence, our agent fees have gone up again and they're far from the smallest in the division.

To give you an idea about the absolute turd that is agents fees, we spent £450,000 on transfer fees last season yet we paid £327,790 in agents fees.

Money for old rope.

Personally I think that agents are nothing but parasites. Anelka's brother made a bloody good living on the strength of representing his brother.

I would like to see the LMA come to an agreement whereby they all agree to refuse to negotiate with agents. It would stop clubs being held to ransom and being ripped off by unscrupulous greedy bastards lining their pockets.

bwfc71 wrote:Lets not forget that in the real word many employers employ people from agencies whether on a temporary basis or a permanent basis and it is the agencies that get paid a "finders" fee.  This principle should also be taken on board with the agents rather than agents taking the large chunk of money, like they currently do!

I agree

Though a finders for agents is normally a per arranged fixed sum against the initial salary or between 8-15% of  the day rate cost, dependent on the arrangement, either way these are not the values football agent seam to command/receive

If this is paid on the day rate then this is paid on each day worked, therefore the agency only get paid as their client works. This makes them responsible for their client to be happy and allows the employer to manage the wage bill without having to keep motivating the workforce. If the worker is found to be lacking in effort or a complete tool they will actually be responsible for addressing this and/or releasing/replace them.
It's all about the application and the experience/effort for a job you are employed to do,

Football could be a whole different world.
Agents are just vultures making a living from others with little regard for anything once a deal is done, they just walk away flashing the cash
 

BWFC71 uses the phrase "in the real world". Well in the real world buyers will pay the market price for a player and what constitutes the market price for a football player is both complex and unusual compared to almost any other procurement. Football is a sellers market these days.
A player's contract is more or less constituted of a list of demands and there is no doubt whatsoever that the player's have the whip hand in the negotiations.
Where else "in the real world" does the employer not have the right to fire an employee and tear up their contract for poor performance? Or make them redundant?
"Win bonuses" are standard, but do they get penalised for losing? I don't think so.
And what happens when the employer falls on hard times? Do the employees take a wage cut to help them get through it?

When an employer in the real world wants to get rid of an employee - for whatever reason - rightly or wrongly it's "do-able" providing the correct process is followed. 
Thanks to Prozone and it's modern equivalent there is probably more and more accurate performance data available about players than any other profession so as their performance can be measured so accurately you'd think that normal employment legislation would apply and players could be sacked for not meeting the agreed performance criteria - but again they're not.

In contract negotiations, a player and his agent can ask for anything they want and that includes paying their second cousin twice removed. If the clubs want they player enough they'll pay whatever is required, to whoever is stipulated for a contract with whatever terms the player and the agent dictate.

Clubs can always choose not to pay that price of course - but as long as there's somebody else down the road who will...