Attending team builds / team leadership meetings

[FrontEnder]

Totally disagree with most of the replies here.

You're obviously a valued member of their team and they value your opinion. It doesn't make you an 'employee' at all to attend their functions or drink their drinks. Are you supposed to put your fingers in your ears if someone starts talking about a project not explicitly mentioned in your schedule ?

Can someone point me to some case law where people have been declared as inside IR35 and paid all back taxes based on the reasons given in these replies ?

I probably wouldn't (and haven't several times) refused free food and drink

What's in case law isn't the only thing you should be thinking of. Just because something hasn't happened in the past, doesn't mean it won't in future.

But yeah, you're right, it might be unlikely that a case would be won or lost based on this, but the company explicit says "we do not view permanent or contract staff as being different". If you needed to sum up IR35 in one sentence, I would struggle to find a better definition of inside than that. The company view him as an employee, if you're investigated and HMRC ask them about your relationship, do you want that to be the answer?

[MrMarkyMark]

I probably wouldn't (and haven't several times) refused free food and drink

What's in case law isn't the only thing you should be thinking of. Just because something hasn't happened in the past, doesn't mean it won't in future.

But yeah, you're right, it might be unlikely that a case would be won or lost based on this, but the company explicit says "we do not view permanent or contract staff as being different". If you needed to sum up IR35 in one sentence, I would struggle to find a better definition of inside than that. The company view him as an employee, if you're investigated and HMRC ask them about your relationship, do you want that to be the answer?

Good points.

The ongling relationship you will have with the client goes right back to when you first engaged with them.
Hence why all contractors within an org are not treated the same.

[radish2008]

Good points.

The ongling relationship you will have with the client goes right back to when you first engaged with them.
Hence why all contractors within an org are not treated the same.

If they were investigated by HMRC then then company is very unlikely to prejudice itself. My point was around the acceptance of plainly ridiculous guidance designed to scare contractors into paying PAYE levels of tax. The link to the case from 2011 is good and I'll read it in detail later but it's obviously not a precedent that HMRC is willing to use in anger. I'm all for a business to business relationship but it has to be practical.

[MrMarkyMark]

If they were investigated by HMRC then then company is very unlikely to prejudice itself. My point was around the acceptance of plainly ridiculous guidance designed to scare contractors into paying PAYE levels of tax. The link to the case from 2011 is good and I'll read it in detail later but it's obviously not a precedent that HMRC is willing to use in anger. I'm all for a business to business relationship but it has to be practical.

Oh for sure, hence why I said I wouldn't have lumped all his concerns into one.

Also, its is good he is at least questioning it, a lot don't.

[Lambert Simnel]

The rationale is that "we do not view permanent or contract staff as being different".

I hear this a lot from middle managers looking to be inclusive. You likely won't hear it from the HR department, and they almost certainly wouldn't reply in that manner to an HMRC query. It's well-meaning management BS. Would you believe them if they say that "our staff are our most valuable asset", "we are determined to be the most environmentally-conscious organisation in our sector", or "living according to our values is more important than making larger profits"?

I honestly wouldn't worry about it. Especially as a PM, it's sensible that you understand all factors which might impact your inbound and outbound dependencies, future funding, competition for key resources, agenda of your key stakeholders etc. Go along, learn, and use it to your advantage in your project.

[Artois]

Thanks for all your replies. It's a bit of a tricky one. Ur I guess I need to decide whether the fancy meals and offsites are worth a small risk of being up for a big fine if I'm audited ...!

[Hobosapien]

It becomes second nature to question every invite and meeting as whether it would look like employee behaviour or could be treated as managing client expectations, then find a reason to decline or not attend if it looks too dodgy.

The most obvious sign they're treating contractors like staff is if they expect the contractors to undergo staff appraisals, which goes without saying is a run for the hills moment.

[l35kee]

I hear this a lot from middle managers looking to be inclusive. You likely won't hear it from the HR department, and they almost certainly wouldn't reply in that manner to an HMRC query. It's well-meaning management BS. Would you believe them if they say that "our staff are our most valuable asset", "we are determined to be the most environmentally-conscious organisation in our sector", or "living according to our values is more important than making larger profits"?

I honestly wouldn't worry about it. Especially as a PM, it's sensible that you understand all factors which might impact your inbound and outbound dependencies, future funding, competition for key resources, agenda of your key stakeholders etc. Go along, learn, and use it to your advantage in your project.

This.. to a point. When I was a permie (in manager role) i made sure contractors were invited to any team gatherings where the objective was to foster a team spirit, thus hoping to improve quality/productivity etc.

We did not invite them to our annual Change Management meeting however, where we discussed the future of the department etc. But they came to pretty much everything else (I doubt HR were involved in any of it).