Overview
- The Japan Fair Trade Commission carried out on-site inspections at the Tokyo headquarters of PERSOL Tempstaff, Staff Service, Recruit Staffing, Adecco Japan and ManpowerGroup on Tuesday as part of an active antitrust probe.
- Investigators are probing reports that senior executives met around late 2022 and agreed to push up nationwide dispatch fees from April 2023, allegedly raising charges by roughly ¥100 per hour for some clerical roles.
- A central focus of the inquiry is whether the higher fees were passed on to dispatched workers or instead boosted the firms' margins, which would violate Japan’s Antimonopoly Act if tied to an agreement among competitors.
- The inspections mark the first time the JFTC has entered the staffing sector in this way, and officials are analyzing emails, meeting records and interviewing staff to determine the scope and timing of any cartel behavior.
- The case touches a market of nearly ¥10 trillion and about 2.2 million dispatched workers, and could affect corporate costs, worker pay and wider industry competition depending on the commission’s findings.