I thought techiferous made a good point - but in many cases the direct contact with the company might re-direct you to the recruiter. I am not sure how it is working in London area but it seems to me that many of the financial firms in NYC are only hiring through an outside agency. Techiferous's point works well if you take the Pareto principle and target that 20% of companies in your sector/ area and write targeted letters about what d you can do for them, etc. I am not sure if there are too may other alternatives at this point. If companies are using recruiters (and I am seeing this in the NYC-area) then they are a necessary evil. Precisely because you are in Edinburgh and your job search is in London

TamDenholm, I agree with your basic principle. But - in my experience you don't really want an adversarial relationship with the recruiter.

I have had recruiters misrepresent me and even send me to the wrong place for interviews. There is a real disconnect at times and often they completely misunderstand the technology they are trying to find someone for. When I deal with them I try to be as simple and 'transactional' as possible. Clearly in your case the recruiter had little or no idea as to why you were not complying with what looked like a simple request (ie to him/her). It might come across as simply being difficult. Don't misunderstand me - I think your point is completely valid. You are being very considerate of yout contacts. I would read your hesitation as coming from a place where you value privacy and where you do not see your contacts as instrumental.

When I was in high school I had what might end up being the best job of my entire life. I cleaned kennels at a veterinarian's office and held the dogs/cats/sometimes horses when the doctor treated them. Great fun everyday learned something new, worked with animals, etc. We had a simple filing system. When someone came in with their pet we would retieve the paper file and on the outside edge there would be a place for a colored sticker - a indicator of the animal's temperament. Red meant extreme caution, yellow meant the animal was fearful and might bite defensvely...

I guess I have internalized this in that I imagine, in this current job market, an absolute flood of applicants. The recruiters are making flash judgements on each person. Since they often do not understand the underlying technology they are basing alot on either simple metrics (number of certifications, etc) and soft skills. Something which comes across like evasion throws up a red flag and in my imaginary world merits a red sticker on the side of your folder. From his/her point of view this is a simple request that you did not comply with. What nefarious crimes are you hiding? I sincerily doubt that s/he thought for a second about privacy concerns.

For me this is where LinkedIn fills a need. My few references are people that are 'pre-approved' to provide this sort of need. The way references are done on LI is that they show the relationship and give the amount/type of contact the person is willing to grant. I am sure that other social networking sites may have a similar function - I only know LinkedIn... When I get asked for references, I have 'preapproved' ones

tl;dr - Use social networking sites (ie LinkedIn) to handle this in advance. Streamline interactions with recruiters.