Firms Are Struggling to Determine Number of Temps in Trade Center

Firms Are Struggling to Determine
Number of Temps in Trade Center

By KEMBA DUNHAM and KRIS MAHER



About 9:45 a.m. on Sept. 11, shortly after two hijacked planes struck the World Trade Center, Jennifer Avena left a phone message at the home of her brother, Gary Bright. He had recently quit a job with an insurance company nearby.

"Aren't you glad you don't work there anymore?" she asked.

But neither she nor her parents knew that the temporary assignment Mr. Bright took on Aug. 21 at Aon Corp. was at 2 World Trade Center. They didn't find out until a family friend told them later that morning. Mr. Bright, 36 years old, is still missing.

Ms. Avena says her family heard from Insurance Overload Systems, the Dallas temp agency that placed Mr. Bright at Aon, several times after the attack. But they have yet to hear from Aon. "Many people who worked for Aon are dead," she says. "Does it matter that some were permanent and others were temps?"

Aon acknowledges that temps were at its office that morning, but spokesman Stephen Ban says the company is still trying to gather information on them. He adds that if any temp or temp family member comes to Aon for assistance, "we would absolutely make sure they'd receive support as far as grief counseling was concerned."

Temps have long been the least visible part of the work force -- a fact that was underscored Sept. 11. While most companies based in the towers were able to account for their full-time workers within days, few know yet how many temps were in their offices that morning, let alone how many made it out alive. The total number working there that morning could be anywhere from several hundred to more than 1,500, says Tim Loncharich, head of Snelling Personnel Services, a Dallas agency.

The very nature of temp work complicates the process of finding workers. Temps tend to be younger and more mobile than many full-time workers, with fewer immediate family ties. The personal information in their records, such as "next of kin," is also more likely to be incomplete or out of date.

Further complicating searches is the haphazard way that temps are sometimes hired. "You may have six or seven different departments in one company hiring temps, and therefore, no single one of them will have a handle on the total number," says Richard Wahlquist, chief executive and executive vice president of the American Staffing Association, an Alexandria, Va., trade association.

At Cantor Fitzgerald LP, the bond-trading firm that lost about 700 of its 1,000 Trade Center employees, a spokesman says the firm doesn't "feel comfortable" giving an exact number of temps working on Sept. 11, though he does say that some temps and/or consultants were there that day.

Even some of the agencies that employ the temps had trouble tracking them down. Snelling had to evacuate its office in lower Manhattan on Sept. 11, making the task particularly difficult. By late that week, it had found 17 of the 18 workers it had assigned to the Twin Towers. One woman is still missing.

Some firms took extraordinary steps to track down every temp worker possibly working in the Trade Center that day. Jim Reese, chief executive of Randstad North America in Atlanta, says he and his colleagues worked around the clock to reach all 809 temps assigned to Manhattan. To find everyone, they had to call numerous corporate supervisors, send staffers registered letters, and get help from the local phone carrier to obtain unlisted numbers. "When we finally got the last one, we gave a big sigh of relief," he recalls.

A major issue facing the temps and their families is benefits. Most employers at the World Trade Center have offered assistance to the families of missing full-time employees. At temp agencies, such services are harder to come by.

But temps may be entitled to some coverage. Jack Taylor, the CEO of Insurance Overload Systems, says Mr. Bright's family may be eligible for a $50,000 lump-sum workers' compensation payment and $6,000 for a memorial service.

Meanwhile, temporary workers have had to adjust to changes in the market in the days since the attacks. Todd Wall, a 30-year-old actor, worked as a temp at Marsh & McLennan Cos. in the World Trade Center, but hadn't arrived at work when the planes hit. As a result, he wasn't paid for the day.

Sloan Staffing Services, the division of Personnel Group of America Inc., Charlotte, N.C., that placed Mr. Wall, made an effort to compensate temps affected by the disaster. As a result, Mr. Wall eventually got $50.

Now some companies displaced by the attacks need temps more than ever. Hugh Lehr, 23, assumed he was out of a job at the FT New York Institute of Finance after its office at the Trade Center was destroyed. But on Sept. 13, Forest Edwards, the New York staffing firm that placed him, told Mr. Lehr his temporary employer would keep paying him while it sought new quarters. "I was very grateful," he says. "I knew that as a temporary worker, they could cut me off."

-- Joann S. Lublin contributed to this article.

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