If you run a recruiting or staffing agency, you already know how tight margins can get. Competition keeps growing, clients expect more, and every interaction needs to count. So the question becomes: how do you pull more revenue out of the work you’re already doing — without adding headcount, buying equipment, or launching some expensive side project?
Why Staffing Agencies Need Extra Revenue Streams Today
Think about who walks through your door every day. Your candidates are people who:
- are applying for jobs abroad,
- need help with documentation — often urgently,
- don’t always know what paperwork is required,
- and trust you to guide them through the process.
You’re already their go-to person for navigating bureaucracy. Adding one more document service to that relationship takes almost no effort — but it can bring in real, consistent extra income.
How Recruiting Agencies Can Earn Extra Revenue: A Real Case from a Small Office
This isn’t a theoretical scenario. It’s a real case — a small recruiting office in Malta that’s been earning additional income through IDA documents for over five years. No marketing budget, no new hires, and practically zero cancellations.
Who is this agent?
- Agent ID: #36
- Country: Malta
- Business type: small recruiting agency helping foreign workers from Southeast Asia
- Registered: April 2020 (right in the middle of COVID lockdowns)
She wasn’t trying to launch a new business. She already had a steady stream of workers coming to her for help with employment abroad — and she realized IDA documents were something many of them actually needed. So she added it as one more thing she could do for the people she was already helping.
The results: 720 documents ordered
Between April 2020 and December 5th, 2025, she has placed:
- 720 paid orders
- 1 single cancellation — in five and a half years
Read that again: one cancellation out of 720 orders. That’s a 0.14% cancellation rate — basically unheard of. The reason is simple: she fills in every application herself, for each worker personally. She knows the data is correct before she hits submit. No guesswork, no typos from clients rushing through a form. Just clean, verified applications — and the results show.
How This Additional Income Model Works
Her approach is straightforward. She doesn’t send referral links or drive web traffic. She manually submits applications on behalf of the workers she’s already helping with employment paperwork. Here’s the economics:
- She buys each document from IDA at a discounted price based on her volume tier.
- From what we understand, she charges her clients around €150 per document.
- That leaves her with roughly €100 profit per sale.
She’s currently at the 47% discount tier — and this is a model that any recruiting or staffing agency can copy.
For reference, here’s the full discount schedule:
- 15% — 1st order
- 30% — 2nd–10th
- 33% — 11th–30th
- 35% — 31st–50th
- 37% — 51st–100th
- 40% — 101st–300th
- 43% — 301st–500th
- 47% — 501st–1,000th
- 50% — from 1,001 onward
Our average base price (before any discount) over the past 5.5 years has been around $60.
How Much This Agent Actually Earned
Let’s break it down per document:
- Resale price: ~€150
- Her cost: IDA base price minus her 47% discount
- Average profit per document: ~€100
Now multiply that across 720 orders:
Estimated earnings:
720 × €100 ≈ €72,000 over 5.5 years.
This isn’t some overnight windfall. It’s €72,000 that trickled in steadily, month after month, alongside her regular recruiting work. She didn’t change her business model. She didn’t take on risk. She just added one more service for people who were already sitting across the desk from her.
Why This Revenue Stream Works for Recruiting Agencies
When you think about it, recruiting agencies are almost perfectly set up for this:
- You’re already collecting personal data, copies of passports, employment documents — adding one more form is nothing.
- Your candidates trust you. When you say “you’ll also need this document,” they listen.
- The process fits straight into your existing workflow — there’s nothing new to learn or build.
- When you handle the submission yourself, cancellations basically don’t happen.
- No paid marketing, no inventory to manage, no financial risk.
It’s a setup that works for everyone:
- We get new clients served by someone who knows what they’re doing.
- You earn a steady side income and your workers see you as even more helpful.
- Your workers get a document they can actually use — locally and internationally.
And because she handles every application personally, the data is clean, the cancellation rate is essentially zero, and nobody’s time gets wasted.
Is this a huge business? No.
Is it a solid long-term income stream? Without a doubt.
An extra €72,000 over 5.5 years — with virtually no risk and completely predictable demand — is the kind of side revenue most small agencies would love to have.
And the kicker: she built this with one office, zero advertising, and no capital investment. Just her existing clients and a few minutes per application.
How to Start Earning Extra Revenue as an IDA Agent
If you operate a:
- recruiting agency,
- staffing agency,
- migration consultancy,
- or any kind of document assistance office,
…you can set up the same system right away. It takes minutes.
Register here: https://idaoffice.org/agent/register/
Screenshots
Other real cases of additional income for small business
See how a small scooter rental in Sri Lanka generated 355 sales in 8 months.
How a travel agency in Saudi Arabia issued 555 documents with zero cancellations.
How notary, translation and multiservice offices can earn extra income.
FAQ
How can a recruiting agency earn extra revenue without major investment?
By offering IDA documents to the workers you’re already helping. There’s no inventory to stock, no ads to run, and no new staff to hire — just one more service added to your existing workflow.
How much extra income can a small recruiting office realistically make?
It depends on your client flow, but to give you a real benchmark: our agent in Malta earned approximately €72,000 over 5.5 years. Some months will be busier than others, but the demand is steady.
Does this model work for staffing firms outside Malta?
Absolutely. It works anywhere agencies place foreign workers, handle seasonal labor, or assist with relocation. The location doesn’t matter — the workflow does.
Published December 05, 2025 • 5m to read
