State of the Market

[Old Greg]

I know people that have sat out for 2 years waiting for their £700 a day rates to be offered on principal

£55K now and next April £40K roles will be gold dust (except the niche skills where rates will hold as supply and demand)


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Are any of these people you know friends of yours?

[GhostofTarbera]

Are any of these people you know friends of yours?

Nope


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[The Bona Fide]

I'm working as a consultant for a council and one of my close colleagues regularly lights up in online meetings I have with her and occasionally other people. I haven't seen anything from the council to 'ban' this - as you say, you can't police it. Maybe Hammersmith just meant when on video calls?

Looks like the ban was issued and is now going to be recinded, according to The San

[Paralytic]

Nope


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Not even the imaginary ones you usually use to try add some credence to your trolling?

[GhostofTarbera]

Not even the imaginary ones you usually use to try add some credence to your trolling?

Not even an imaginary one this time


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[NowPermOutsideUK]

I know people that have sat out for 2 years waiting for their £700 a day rates to be offered on principal

£55K now and next April £40K roles will be gold dust (except the niche skills where rates will hold as supply and demand)


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Thats funny

I know many people who went from 40K to 600 per day and they are still hanging on somehow

I dont know any that went from 600 per day to 40K

Must be just me ....

[PCTNN]

Yeah I would rather sit out. Basically going from like 9k net to 2.5k net depending on your tax position... for probably a similar workload. Doesn't make sense. If that happened to traditional business they'd just close shop.

I'd rather just sit out for a year and learn a new skill or programming language or even just holiday on the cheap.

After multiple years at 600 pd you should be able to sit out a year without issues.

So much bulltulip in this post.

A couple of things:

- in normal times, sitting out for a year might be an option because you know there would be contracts to come back to. Put ir35, covid, brexit in the mix and you'll see the number of contracts you'll be able to come back to in 2021/2022 will not be as many so your 1 year off might well become 18-24 months, and THEN you'll have to take a 40k permie job if you're lucky to find one given your big employment gap.

- "holiday on the cheap"? what does that even mean? Are you going on holiday alone? Can your partner take that much time off? Don't you have a social life/social commitments? You just take and leave? Bulltulip

[KinooOrKinog]

That’s the new norm, that £40K role will be £30K come April when still in lockdown


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I recently had a call from an agent about an HR systems role 'perfect for me' (my background is finance and procurement apps) at £39k, FTC one year. I told her that I'm in a contract just now so not currently looking, but for that type of role and skill level her client should be ashamed of themselves for trying to take advantage.

According to her, it's not the fault of the clients who are offering pitiful rates 'it's actually the contractors who are driving down rates. A lot of them are so desperate they'll work for anything at the moment'. Her words, not mine.

Btw, I'm aware of the concept of supply and demand. I'm also aware that a lot of people have no choice but to take a cr*ppy rate at the moment but still.

So there you have it. It's all our fault.

[GhostofTarbera]

Thats funny

I know many people who went from 40K to 600 per day and they are still hanging on somehow

I dont know any that went from 600 per day to 40K

Must be just me ....

And 2 years ago I would have called you crazy for even discussing such a drop

People are just dropping back to where they came from


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[jayn200]

Why do people spout this. In what world is 600 pd translating to 108k p.a? Yes, it's a massive drop from 600 pd to 40k PAYE, but please start at something realistic. Somebody young an impressionable could be reading these pages.

It is if you're in contract the whole time. I get that you're only ever going to extract 100k a year and net like 94k for a 2 director company a year but that extra money left in the company is still retained earnings and as a director you still own it so it should still be included imo.