# How to open a recruitment and employment placement agency in Moldova

A licence covers employment placement, whether you send people to an employer in Chisinau or to one abroad. Temporary staffing received rules of its own on 1 January 2026 and needs only a notification, while HR consulting and training sell from your first month.

## In brief

- **CAEM codes:** Division 78 and related codes
- **Licence:** Yes, for placement (issued by ASP, 5 years)
- **Licence fee:** 3,250 lei (around 160 euro, half in your first year)
- **Share capital:** No minimum

## The employment placement licence: who issues it and what it costs

Placing people in employment requires a licence from the Public Services Agency, valid for five years. There are two separate licences: one for placing citizens inside the country and one for placing them abroad. The fee is 3,250 lei, and a company registered no more than a year before it applies pays half.

| Code | Activity | What it means in practice |
| --- | --- | --- |
| 78.10 | Activities of employment placement agencies | The base code of a recruitment agency: you find candidates and place them with an employer, at home or abroad. |

- **Licence: Licence for the activity of placing citizens in employment inside the country** — Public Services Agency, valid for 5 years. Brokering employment between a jobseeker and an employer in the Republic of Moldova.
- **Licence: Licence for the activity of placing citizens in employment abroad** — Public Services Agency, valid for 5 years. Brokering employment for a foreign beneficiary. A single licence is issued, and every new foreign beneficiary is registered with the licensing authority.

**Who buys it:** The employer pays, not the candidate. At home the buyers are companies opening new sites without an HR team of their own: manufacturing, retail, logistics, construction, IT. Abroad the foreign beneficiary pays, and the law starts from that principle — payments may be collected from jobseekers only for the categories and services the Government authorises.

**What is different about the money:** The fee is almost always a percentage of the annual salary of the person placed. That ties your revenue to the level of wages in the market, which climbs year after year: the same placement, done the same way, is worth more each year. The start-up cost is the licensing file, paid once every five years.

## Temporary work agent: the notification to the Labour Inspectorate

Since 1 January 2026 the Labour Code recognises the temporary work agent, and the activity runs on a prior notification to the State Labour Inspectorate rather than on a licence. You employ the people yourself, on an individual employment contract, and place them at the disposal of a user. An assignment runs up to 12 months and, with extensions, up to 24.

| Code | Activity | What it means in practice |
| --- | --- | --- |
| 78.20 | Temporary employment agency activities | Work through a temporary work agent: the people are your employees and work at the user, on assignment. |
| 78.30 | Other human resources provision | Supplying personnel outside the temporary assignment scheme, including on a long-term basis. |

- **Notification: Notification of activity as a temporary work agent** — State Labour Inspectorate. Placing your own employees at the disposal of a user, to work temporarily under its supervision and direction.

**Who buys it:** The user is any company with peaks it does not want to cover with permanent hires: factories in season, warehouses over the holidays, retail at store openings, agriculture at harvest, event organisers. This is the branch with the shortest path from "we need people" to a signed contract, because the user is not opening a position — it is buying an assignment.

**What is different about the money:** Here the wages sit on your payroll, not the client’s: you pay the people through the assignment and invoice the user. A temporary employee gets the same basic conditions they would have if hired directly by the user, and you have no right to charge them any payment, commission or fee. The margin is built into the rate, not taken from the worker.

- **10 July 2025 — Law no. 193/2025.** The Labour Code gains Chapter XVI¹, which regulates work through a temporary work agent: an individual employment contract with the temporary employee, placement at the disposal of a user, and assignments of limited duration.
- **1 January 2026 — Chapter XVI¹ enters into force.** Activity as a temporary work agent runs on a prior notification to the State Labour Inspectorate. The notification template was approved by Inspectorate order no. 02-a of 2 January 2026.

## HR consulting, training and job boards: what you sell with no permit

HR consulting, candidate assessment, training and your own job board need no licence. You declare them at registration alongside the division 78 codes and invoice them from the first month. These are the services that bring revenue between placements, because they are paid per project rather than per candidate hired.

| Code | Activity | What it means in practice |
| --- | --- | --- |
| 70.22 | Business and other management consultancy activities | HR consulting: org charts, salary bands, assessment, personnel policy. |
| 85.59 | Other education n.e.c. | Courses and training programmes for the client’s staff or for your own candidates. |
| 63.12 | Web portals | Your own job board. If you also broker the hire through it, the placement licence applies. |
| 82.99 | Other business support service activities n.e.c. | Personnel administration and office services sold to the client alongside recruitment. |

**Permits:** Business and management consulting, training and web portals appear nowhere among the licensed activities. The licence follows the placement itself, not the channel: the moment you actually broker the hire, the placement licence applies, however digital the route to it was.

**Who buys it:** The same clients as recruitment, on a different budget and a different calendar. Companies buy assessments when they promote from within, courses when they change processes, platform subscriptions when they hire continuously. The contracts are smaller than a placement, sign faster and renew annually.

**What is different about the money:** Start-up cost is close to zero: no permit to pay for and no stock to carry. What you need is methodology, assessment tools and people who can use them. A platform subscription or a framework training contract gives you predictable monthly revenue that covers the team in the months without placements.

## What people earn in recruitment and employment services

An employee in administrative and support services earned around 670 euro gross a month at the end of 2025, and the level had climbed by roughly 12% in a year. For a recruitment agency that figure is not a cost — it is the basis of the calculation: the fee is a percentage of the salary of the person placed, so wages that rise raise your invoice without you changing anything about how you work.

The figure is for the whole statistical section, not for one occupation: the same category gathers cleaning, guarding, secretarial work, recruitment and landscaping. The salaries you negotiate, for the roles you close, settle around other levels — higher in IT and construction, lower in retail and manufacturing. Read the roughly 670 euro as the market's reference point, not as your own rate.

Direction matters more than level. A market where wages are rising is a market where employers are competing for the same people, and that is exactly the moment they outsource their recruiting.

## Why now is a good time to open a recruitment agency

Because 2026 added a line of business that until now was done through contractual detours. Since 1 January, work through a temporary work agent has its own chapter in the Labour Code: you employ the people yourself, place them at the disposal of a user for an assignment of up to 12 months, and invoice the service. The rules are written down, and entry takes a notification to the State Labour Inspectorate rather than a licensing file. Anyone taking a position now does so under new rules that are the same for everyone.

The second branch — employment placement — needs a licence, and that is precisely why it is worth it. Eighty-four companies in the whole country hold one, and the list is public, so you can read it before you enter and know exactly who you are sharing the market with. The licence filters the competition: 3,250 lei, premises, diplomas, a clean record and the contracts agreed with the National Employment Agency. None of that is a high bar for someone building a serious firm, but it is enough to keep the market from filling with intermediaries who last a month.

The third source of revenue asks for nothing at all: HR consulting, assessment and training sell from the first month, with the same team and to the same clients. Many agencies start here, build their portfolio of companies, and file the licensing application once they already have somewhere to place people.

## What it costs to open an employment placement agency

Registering the company is the cheap and fast part. An SRL has no mandatory minimum share capital, the file is submitted to the Public Services Agency, and the company is usually registered within a few working days.

The licence is the second cost and the easiest to plan: 3,250 lei — around 160 euro — or half of that, 1,625 lei, if the company was registered no more than a year before the application. That is a good reason not to postpone: the reduction applies once, in your first one-year window. Amending the licence when your details change costs 10% of the fee, capped at 585 lei.

The rest of the start-up budget goes into things that show up both in the file and in the sale: accessible non-residential premises with a telephone and electronic means of communication, an official web page, the diplomas and criminal record certificates of the team, plus the recruiting tools — platform subscriptions, your own candidate database, assessment tests. And if you also go into temporary staffing, you need working capital for wages: the people are on your payroll from the first day of the assignment, and the invoice to the user comes after.

## What to know before you open the agency

### The licence is prepared before the file, not after

The licensing conditions are not something you settle on the day you apply. The administrator, the associates and the employees of the agency must be citizens of the Republic of Moldova with permanent domicile or temporary residence in the country; the administrator and the employees must hold a bachelor's degree; criminal record certificates are required for the administrator, the founder, the associates, the employees and for the company itself. The premises must be non-residential, easily accessible to all categories of citizens, and equipped with a telephone and electronic means of communication.

The right order is simple: first the structure of the company and the team, then the documents, then the application. We prepare the file in parallel with registration, so the licence arrives shortly after the certificate rather than half a year later.

### The intermediation contract is agreed with the National Employment Agency

The draft employment intermediation contract is drawn up in Romanian and agreed with the National Employment Agency before licensing. For placement abroad, add the collaboration agreements with foreign beneficiaries, their incorporation documents translated, notarised and apostilled, and the documents obtained during the prior verification of the beneficiary.

Also for placement abroad, the licensing authority asks for the opinion of the State Labour Inspectorate, which responds within seven working days on issuing or extending the licence. A single licence is issued, and each new foreign beneficiary is notified and registered as you go — so a portfolio of foreign clients can grow without a new file.

### Temporary staffing brings a different cash flow

With placement you collect a fee after the person has been hired. With temporary work you pay wages for the whole assignment and collect on an invoice, on the terms agreed with the user. Two money models in one company, and the second one needs a cash reserve from the start.

It is worth the effort, because it brings recurring revenue and contracts that renew season after season. A temporary employee gets the same basic working conditions they would have if hired directly by the user, and no payment, commission or fee may be charged to them — the margin sits in the rate to the user. Payroll, contributions and the invoicing calendar are ours to run, so you can look after clients and candidates.

## Which legal form to choose: SRL, ÎI or SA

For a recruitment agency the answer is an SRL. Liability stays limited to the share capital, there is no minimum capital threshold, and the licensing file is built around a legal person: it asks for the criminal record of the founder, of the associates and of the company itself.

The individual enterprise looks simpler than it is. The law says plainly that it is not a legal person and appears in legal relations as a natural person trading individually, and that the owner bears unlimited liability with their entire personal estate. When your work means putting people into employment relationships and answering for what follows, the form that keeps your personal money out of the risk is the SRL.

A joint-stock company has no place here at the start. It is the form designed for capital brought in by several investors, not for a business built on contracts, on reputation and on a database of candidates.

## Frequently asked questions

### Do you need a licence for a recruitment agency in Moldova?

Yes, if you place people in employment. The licence is issued by the Public Services Agency, is valid for five years and comes in two forms: one for placing citizens inside the country and one for placing them abroad. HR consulting, assessment and training fall outside the licence and can be sold from the first month.

### How much does the employment placement licence cost?

The fee is 3,250 lei, around 160 euro. If the company was registered no more than a year before the application, the fee is 50% of that — 1,625 lei. The file is examined in ten working days, and the licence covers five years, so it is paid once every five years.

### What conditions must you meet for the licence to place people abroad?

The administrator and the employees are citizens of the Republic of Moldova with permanent domicile or temporary residence in the country and hold a bachelor’s degree, with no criminal record. The company has accessible non-residential premises with a telephone and electronic means of communication, agreements with pre-verified foreign beneficiaries, and its model contracts agreed with the National Employment Agency.

### What paperwork does a temporary work agent need?

A prior notification to the State Labour Inspectorate, using the template the Inspectorate approved. No licence is required. The rules apply from 1 January 2026, when Chapter XVI¹ of the Labour Code entered into force, and a temporary assignment can run 12 months, extendable to 24 in total.

### What CAEM code does a recruitment agency use?

The base code is 78.10, the activities of employment placement agencies. For temporary staffing you add 78.20 and 78.30, and for the related services — 70.22 for consulting, 85.59 for training and 63.12 for your job board. A company may declare several principal activities at registration.

### Can a foreign founder open a recruitment agency in Moldova?

An SRL registers with no restrictions on foreign founders. The placement licence adds a requirement of its own: the administrator, the associates and the employees of the agency are citizens of the Republic of Moldova with permanent domicile or temporary residence in the country. The structure is settled before the file is filed, and we show you the version that passes.

Choosing the CAEM codes, drafting the constitutive documents and filing with the Public Services Agency are part of the registration service.