State of the Market

[TheDude]

I wondered what these GOV dev contracts paid cause they never list rates, lower than I expected for senior/lead! Then again I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised, doesn’t seem worth it to me when plenty of middling UK companies will offer 100k perm salary

I have just been offered a Gov contract. Outside IR35 with a day rate equal to the last outside rate I had in banking back in 2020. It is 25% less than the inside banking role I will be finishing next week.

It's a fairly hefty drop in income but I need to take a break from banking.

I am not bothered about the drop in income but have never worked in the public sector so I hope the people signing my timesheet are not ****s.

[willendure]

I am not bothered about the drop in income but have never worked in the public sector so I hope the people signing my timesheet are not ****s.

Lol. Don't worry, public sector is practically a holiday camp. Did 3 public sector contracts back to back, after that I was worried going back to the commercial sector, as I though I might have lost the ability to... work.

[oliverson]

Market rates + your negotiating skills. But since they are inside IR35 the umbrella company takes a cut and there is limited scope for claiming expenses and if you live far from the office you cannot claim travel expenses. Someone I used to work with was loosing a day's pay every week, because she had to travel across the country for meetings that could've been done on Zoom. The only advantage of those contracts is that once you have clearance it is easier to move to another role that requires clearance.

Seems like Labour are considering raising 'Employers' National Insurance, so expect even more tax to be paid on those inside roles. One potential upside is that perm roles may disappear in favour of inside roles.

[avonleigh]

Lol. Don't worry, public sector is practically a holiday camp. Did 3 public sector contracts back to back, after that I was worried going back to the commercial sector, as I though I might have lost the ability to... work.

Same. Done a lot of public sector roles and it's a different environment completely. No having to work your butt off to meet a deadline as they are usually shifted without any drama.

[dsc]

Question for you all. If we are right now in a recession or depression (whatever that means), why is it not mainstream news? 90s recession, dot-com, gfc, covid recessions were all big news stories.

Is it because central banks and governments are massaging figures and lying too avoid spreading a panic and still talking up the soft-landing narrative?

Or is it still early days and contracting is just one of the canaries in the mine?

Or is it that some other fundamental has shifted in our industry and not connected to the wider economy? For example, the huge amount of legal migration and T2 visas discussed earlier in this thread? Cheap bums on seats and more work going to big consultancies and out sourcing to the sub-continent of India?

I don't get this either, same tulip with news about lay offs etc. the only major one was Intel where stocks went down pronto, but loads of companies are laying off in the states and nothing, markets just keep going up. US now announced they cocked up on employment figures by almost a million and? nothing, everything is still great, all good. You might see a small bump here and there, but overall, tulip just keeps growing.

How can it be so bad when it's so good?

[rocktronAMP]

I have just been offered a Gov contract. Outside IR35 with a day rate equal to the last outside rate I had in banking back in 2020. It is 25% less than the inside banking role I will be finishing next week.

It's a fairly hefty drop in income but I need to take a break from banking.

I am not bothered about the drop in income but have never worked in the public sector so I hope the people signing my timesheet are not ****s.

Congratulations TheDude!

So did you hold onto your LTD company whilst you were working Inside IR35?
I closed off mine in 2021. It would be a very long time paying the accountancy their fees for a dormant business. Although my old accountant offered me 45% discount off each month. But I thought what was the point for Fixed Term Contract 2020 and then I went Perm in 2021.

I have seen contracts £500 per day for Outside IR35 within GOV.UK for software engineering roles. Perhaps, a bit higher for a tech-lead position. However, those have been few and far between, and of course somebody Head of Dept XYZ in GOV has to signed off the SDS eventually against the HMRC. Congrats in order though. There is ONE GREEN LEAF SHOOT OUT THERE THAT IS FACT. May your contract length be long e.g. 12 months or so....

I'd go myself back to contracting, but I'm tulip scared of the volatility of this social-economic financial mess.

[TheLordDave]

After being on the bench since March I am starting a 4 month outside role next week.

rate wise 40% less than my last contract…. And monthly invoicing 30 days payment. So I will still be skint for a while.

hopefully things pickup by the time this one is finished, although that will be Christmas so I expect it won’t.

[SussexSeagull]

After being on the bench since March I am starting a 4 month outside role next week.

rate wise 40% less than my last contract…. And monthly invoicing 30 days payment. So I will still be skint for a while.

hopefully things pickup by the time this one is finished, although that will be Christmas so I expect it won’t.

Stops you using up your financial reserves and takes you 4 months nearer the hope of a market recovery.

[TheDude]

Congratulations TheDude!

So did you hold onto your LTD company whilst you were working Inside IR35?
I closed off mine in 2021. It would be a very long time paying the accountancy their fees for a dormant business. Although my old accountant offered me 45% discount off each month. But I thought what was the point for Fixed Term Contract 2020 and then I went Perm in 2021.

I have seen contracts £500 per day for Outside IR35 within GOV.UK for software engineering roles. Perhaps, a bit higher for a tech-lead position. However, those have been few and far between, and of course somebody Head of Dept XYZ in GOV has to signed off the SDS eventually against the HMRC. Congrats in order though. There is ONE GREEN LEAF SHOOT OUT THERE THAT IS FACT. May your contract length be long e.g. 12 months or so....

I'd go myself back to contracting, but I'm tulip scared of the volatility of this social-economic financial mess.

I closed my LTD down last year but there was only 10k left so not much extra tax to pay when start a new company

[sreed]

I have just been offered a Gov contract. Outside IR35 with a day rate equal to the last outside rate I had in banking back in 2020. It is 25% less than the inside banking role I will be finishing next week.

It's a fairly hefty drop in income but I need to take a break from banking.

I am not bothered about the drop in income but have never worked in the public sector so I hope the people signing my timesheet are not ****s.

I've only ever done one PS contract - inside PM role last year at 600pd. No issues with timesheets or pay, and the work environment for me was pretty similar to the big-corp places I've worked at, with the exception of an even higher level of tick-box top-down bureaucratic BS with respect to "hybrid".

Contract extensions were also done very piecemeal (started with 3 months followed by 1 month extensions) and very last minute due to budget issues.

They weren't happy with signing off my customary 4-5 week break over summer, and there was no chance of temporarily working outside the UK (like I'm doing this summer at my current private sector client) so we had to part ways at that point.

As you're on an outside contract, a lot of the above will probably not be relevant to you.