State of the Market

[Bluenose]

April 2020 isn't a good yardstick. It's the month IR35 should have set in but they cancelled it last minute. Caught everyone out.

Its a fair point fella, i think the sentiment is that we hit the floor and have bounced off it, for now!

[SussexSeagull]

Got turned down for a contract but was told over 150 people went for it. Oddly I find that quite uplifting as I would have expected loads more.

Small victories.

[founder]

150 for one contract, sheesh kebabs things are bad

[ladymuck]

150 for one contract, sheesh kebabs things are bad

You think that's bad? That's pretty good for the current environment, I'd say.

Unless, of course, it's a really niche role

[dangerouswhensober]

State of the Market

I'm pretty sure there were over 400 applicants for my current contract.

Reason I know is because - it's a government department - they advertised through two agencies on their PSL - my agency and Hays.

My agent said that they received over 200 CVs - Hays would have received more, because they are a much larger agency.

Hays sent 45 CVs to the client, my agency sent 6 - total of 51 CVs sent to the client.

Client filtered the CVs received and interviewed 16 candidates.

(I know this because my boss told me - he did the interviewing.)

I've been contracting for 20+ years, and I can't remember conditions like these.

To be honest - I have a particular tech specialisation together with management skills - and I think that only 5-10 of those 400+ applicants would have suitable expertise & experience for this contract. The rest were just desperate and clicked on the 'submit' button in Jobserve ...

(My agent also told me that he had applications from Programme Directors - for a specialised tech position ... !!!)

[BlackCountryContractor]

Just managed to boom with a long term contract for 9 months outside of IR35 after sitting on the bench since november. Heart goes out to everyone who is on the bench atm as I found it nearly almost stressful to the worst degree having to sit around with nothing to do with the lockdown so my sympathies to you guys and girls.

Stay safe everyone

[anonymouse]

4 months into a 6 month gig, I get moved to another project, the other guy gets canned, but he doesn't know yet.

[Gould The Swimmer]

Got turned down for a contract but was told over 150 people went for it. Oddly I find that quite uplifting as I would have expected loads more.

Small victories.

I won't ask how you've been finding the market then.

I've picked up 3 weeks work doing some theming for a graphics bureau in London but the rate is 40% lower than my normal rate. At the end of the day it will buy me an extra months survival should it go to the wire.

That's how I'm looking at things and that's how worried I am.

[heyya99]

4 months into a 6 month gig, I get moved to another project, the other guy gets canned, but he doesn't know yet.

Not to be a killjoy but if you're outside IR35 I'd watch moving projects as it might look permie.

[anonymouse]

Not to be a killjoy but if you're outside IR35 I'd watch moving projects as it might look permie.

Already inside, with an uplift to cover costs