The Ultimate Guide to Travel Therapy Negotiation

Disclaimer

This may not apply to you if you are dead set on a particular setting and location.

I prioritize pay and location, and I am willing to work in almost any setting. So if you are dead set on working in an outpatient clinic in San Diego or Hawaii, you might have to settle for less pay.

I travel in CA which has abundant job openings. This strategy may be riskier in states with less travel jobs. I highly recommend getting a license in CA if you can, or in multiple states that have a decent amount of travel jobs.

Step 1:

ALWAYS work with multiple travel companies. I usually use 2-3 at a time.

Be transparent with your recruiters that you will be using multiple companies in order to find the best opportunity for yourself. Good recruiters will not care if you use multiple companies. And just as important, you must choose recruiters who are willing to negotiate and who will not low ball the initial offer badly. Make sure one of the companies that you use is a small travel company because they can offer higher pay since they have lower overhead costs.

However, smaller travel companies do not have as many jobs compared to larger companies. Therefore, I would recommend having one of the companies that you use be a larger one. But I would avoid working with some larger companies who tell you that new grad therapists can only make a certain amount of money. This is BS. New grad PTs can make $2000+/a week take home. In fact, at my upcoming position, I will be 1 of 3 travel PTs there using the same travel company, and I will be the highest paid despite having the least amount of experience due to my negotiation skills.

Step 2:

Try to line up multiple interviews in the same week because if a place offers you a job, they will want to know whether or not you will accept the position within 1-3 days.

That’s why you need to have the interviews lined up in the same week if possible. I usually ask all of my recruiters which job openings they have for the areas I’m interested in working in, and then I tell all of the recruiters which jobs I want to apply for on the same day. That way I will most likely have all the phone interviews around the same dates.

Step 3:

Next, determine a minimum weekly take home pay that you would be satisfied with.

Keep the minimum acceptable weekly take home pay to yourself… do not let your recruiters know the number or else they will know what you will settle for. Instead, ask your recruiters for the highest paying jobs in the state/area you want to work in. Or ask for all the job openings in the state/area that you want to work in with the estimated weekly take home pay listed next to each job opening. Also, do not tell your recruiter the amount of money you have made in your past contracts unless the number is very high (i.e. >$2000/week take home for PTs)

Step 4:

Never negotiate for a higher weekly take home pay until after you receive the job offer.

So, if a travel company tells me the estimated weekly take home pay for a certain job is $1800, I will not ask for more money right away.

The only time I will ask for more money right away (before doing the interview) is if another travel company is offering a higher initial weekly take home pay for the same job. In that case, I will ask the travel company to match or beat the initial offer presented by their competition before deciding which travel company I will use to submit my application to the same job. (because you don’t want to double apply to the same job with 2 different companies).

The reason why I never negotiate for a higher weekly take home pay until after I receive the job offer is because recruiters will do anything they can to sign you up for that job once you receive an offer from the company. You have a lot of negotiation power once a company offers you a job because you are the commodity. The only thing preventing the travel agent from making money is you signing the contract. It is important to try and take a day or two to think about a job offer (even if it’s a job you want) because the recruiters will usually try to entice you to accept that job by offering a higher weekly take home pay and/or overtime pay.

I’ve had a recruiter increase my weekly take home pay from $1675-$1800, as well as my overtime pay from $51/hr to $63/hr, by delaying my decision for 2 days because I told the recruiter that I had another interview coming up that was offering more money. (But it can be risky to wait a few days as well since other people may interview for the same job in that time, but I’m more of a risk taker).

If you don’t want to risk waiting a few days on a job that was offered to you, see step 5.

Step 5:

Always tell the recruiter that you have multiple job interviews lined up that week, and that some of the jobs offer more money and/or provide a better career growth opportunity (only if this is true).

The reason I say this is because when a job accepts you, you can tell the recruiter that you need more time to think about it because you have another interview coming up that is offering more money and/or is a better career growth opportunity.

At this point, I ask the recruiter if they can make their offer more competitive. I tell them that I will be willing to forgo the other interviews if they can make their offer more competitive. I then assess what the recruiter offers, and then I usually counteroffer with a higher weekly take home pay number. If the recruiter cannot increase the weekly take home pay any further, I then ask for a higher travel reimbursement and/or overtime rate (Personally, I would rather have a higher travel reimbursement because I do not like working overtime). The recruiter will usually increase their offer somehow to entice you to sign up with them and steal you away from the other travel company.

Also, there is no point in negotiating for a higher overtime rate if the company you interviewed with tells you that they do not want travelers to work overtime. In this case, I would attempt to negotiate for a higher travel reimbursement and/or CEU reimbursement if the recruiter is unable to increase the weekly take home pay any further. I would also always try and negotiate for 40 hours guaranteed. It’s a great feeling working only 30 hours during the week and still being paid as if you worked 40 hours. And finally, always make sure your holiday rate and overtime rate are at least $50/hour or higher. If not, I would not recommend working overtime or holidays.

In summary, I was able to increase the offer of my first contract as a new grad from $1675/wk to $1904/wk take home and the overtime pay from $51/hr to $63/hr by using the strategy listed above. I also got 40 hours guaranteed.

For my next contract, I was able to increase the offer from $2100/wk to $2200/wk take home and the travel reimbursement from $0 to $125 using the strategy listed above. This contract is also 40 hours guaranteed, and has a OT/holiday rate of $84/hour.

Additional Tips to Increase Your Weekly Take Home Pay:

Try and have the recruiter lower your taxable hourly rate. For one of my contracts, my recruiter lowered my taxable hourly rate from $17.50/hr to $17.00/hr. This increased my weekly take home pay offer from $1800/week to $1850/week. At first, I thought $17.00/hr for a PT is illegal, but after consulting with Travel Tax, they informed me that as long as your tax home is legit (i.e. you have a paper trail that you are paying rent there and other proof that this location is your permanent address) then $17/hr is legal. Ask your recruiter to lower your taxable hourly rate to see if it can increase your weekly take home pay. And always consult with Travel Tax as well to make sure you aren’t breaking the law. Because if you ever get audited and are doing something illegal, it is you that will have to pay everything back, not the travel company.

Present yourself as having value to your recruiter. If the recruiter believes you can provide added value (i.e. you are able to help them make money), they will be more inclined to take less of the bill rate and provide you with a larger weekly take home pay.

Some examples you can use include:

• Tell the recruiter you plan to travel for a long time, so you can be a potential source of constant income. Therefore, you deserve a higher cut of the bill rate since you can be a constant source of income to the recruiter.

• Tell the recruiter you will refer all your therapist friends who are interested in travel therapy to him/her.