Travel agencies in the san jose, CA area

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I'm going to be moving to the San Jose, California area. I'm looking for travelers advice, pros and cons of agencies where they have worked. Best and worst agencies? Advantages to working for an agency over taking a position in a hospital.

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No advantage to working a travel assignment versus staff in San Jose. You are not eligible for travel tax benefits, you will get paid less, bad to terrible benefits, no sick leave, PTO, paid holidays and vacations, and you may miss out on a good relocation and sign on bonus.

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Thank you very much for your advice. My plan was to look for a job at a hospital similar to the one I currently work in but I had a lot of people saying I should take a travel assignment. Very confusing.

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The one advantage to travel is for some California hospitals, that is the only pathway to getting a staff job. If they like you, you are in.

But try for the staff job first.

Another issue are the common do not compete clauses that don't allow you to go perm until 6 months after your travel contract(s) unless the hospital will pay your agency a very healthy commission.

There is no harm in asking travel companies if they have temp to perm assignments. I'd guess that is unlikely in San Jose but it might be possible at the HCA hospital there (possibly one of worst places to work).

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HCA hopitals? Which are those that I should stay away from? Is it hard to get a staff job in california hospitals?

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Specializes in ICU.
HCA hopitals? Which are those that I should stay away from? Is it hard to get a staff job in california hospitals?

Health Corporation America.They are slightly more tolerable to work for in California due to having to follow nurse patient ratio law. Benefits stink.

Yes, it is hard to get a staff job even with experience in California especially the bay area.

My advice would be to do local travel to test the waters with all the hospitals nearby you. San Jose has Kaiser's (only way to get is travel contract but they treat you bad as a traveler), HCA, Santa Clara County Hospital, Stanford nearby (snooty and picky place to get hired at).

What is your speciality?

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Operating room, level one trauma with burn center. I was thinking about santa clara valley med.

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Specializes in ICU.
Operating room, level one trauma with burn center. I was thinking about santa clara valley med.

You can get really good contracts for that area as an OR RN. Kaiser will still float you to PACU. When you work for them you are expected to float to one other area (this holds true as a staff nurse).

ICU nurses get it the worse. They force them to go work tele & med surg. Top pay but their is a headache attached to that. Shifts will be 8hours. Keep in mind most of Kaiser jobs are for internal employees. They just have to make it seem like it is available to the public due to their union contract.

A travel nurse I know was looking for perm jobs with Stanford. He found out through recruitment that they often just post jobs just to collect applications. Who has time for games? Just don't bank on them, you never know what is a real post or fake job post. That is frustrating when you are looking for a perm job.

You can find Stanford and Santa Clara hospital union contract online.

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Sounds like Kaiser is out for me. It also sounds like I might just skip the travel stuff and go work in a hospital. Stick to what I know. Hopefully I can get in at SCVMC.

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Haven't looked lately, but Kaiser in San Jose at one time posted listing after listing of "20 hours or less" type jobs, on call. Guess one could have squeezed their toe through the door, but more likely that they kept their staffing up to par with plenty of part timers.

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Specializes in ICU.
Sounds like Kaiser is out for me. It also sounds like I might just skip the travel stuff and go work in a hospital. Stick to what I know. Hopefully I can get in at SCVMC.

LOL, you don't want to be cross trained into PACU??

"Registered Nurse assigned in a particular service area will floatwithin the service area as defined:a) Between Critical Care Unitsb) Between Telemetry Units (including mixed MedSurg/Teleunits)c) Between Medical Surgical Units (including mixed MedSurg/Teleunits)d) Between like Maternal Child Health Unitse) Between like Periop Units "

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Lol, not really. I'll keep fingers crossed and hope when I apply, I at least get a call to interview. Ugh.

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