Completely lost

[Mustang]

A couple of things that I have done:-

1) Attended PAYE workshops run by HMRC's business support teams. In these they define their view of employement. By incorportating the opposite of these in your contracts helps to avoid IR35

2) Have each contract reviewed by my accountants contracts specialist. Slowly I am building up my own knowledge of what needs to be in the contract but a second opinion is always helpful.

3) Change your accountant if he is not helping you stay outside of IR35

[malvolio]

Dont rely on it but recent court cases and related commentaries seem to indicate that taking a sensible wage - like £25k and divvies from retained profits, rather than NMW and regular divvies - would keep you off Hector's radar. Not convinced myself, nor have I done the sums, but the idea of paying an extra £2k NICs a year to avoid an investigation and all the associated hassle does have a certain appeal!