State of the Market

[hugebrain]

Public sector is a good place to be at the moment. A bunch of us just got the nod for extensions into Q1 next year.

Not all doom and gloom eh.

The rates seem pretty good too.

Test & trace consultants are paid GBP7,360 a DAY: Fury as private sector company is handed cash | Daily Mail Online

Maybe we should all join then public sector!

[MisterLysenkiy]

Remember my story complaining about being offered 40K perm after 2+ years of 600p/day outside?

Firstly 40K turned in 45K, but then I managed the client to turn this 40K perm offer into a contract with 350p/day and what is important - outside IR35. The client was desperate to get me on board, so had to play the game on my rules. But that happened only because I did not say "no" to the initial 40K perm offer and went to the interview for curiosity and for the sake of taking interviewing practice, as I always do. The interview went perfectly well and that resulted in this offer conversion.

Not 600 of course as it was pre-Covid, but I am also planning to take a perm from the American time zone in addition to this contract. This perm won't pay too much at all, maybe 55K of perm via their UK-registered office. This perm is my dream job within a dream-team, so basically, I'd be doing whatever I am doing with my pet projects at GitHub (quite popular), so I mostly treat it like a hobby-on-a-daily-schedule plus very good for my CV as this American employer is the platform vendor itself.

Due to the differences in the time zone of 5 hrs, I think it will be easier to combine both works. All the calls and meetings won't intersect in the time.

Not sure how it wil go in real life, but definitely worth of trying as I am not losing anything from this attempt

[PCTNN]

so how many hours a day will you be working?

[ViatoremDiEfa]

Just got an offer for a contract in Munich for a component verification role. It is from a legit agent and a legit client. 55 Euro an hour! This sort of work would have been priced at 80 per hour (at least) pre covid. Due to the nature of the work, none of it can be done from home. The agent said that he could maybe do another 5 euro an hour. We both agreed that the budget set by the client is "ambitious".

[rocktronAMP]

Congrats.

And presumbly:

• you don't have an "other half" spouse, wifey or partner that needs attention or love (isn't that back to front?)
• you have no kids
• you have no pets (e.g. dogs that need walking)
• you live on your own
• you have a grand home office away from it all
• you don't have noisy neighbours

How did you get the USA gig?

[SussexSeagull]

Remember my story complaining about being offered 40K perm after 2+ years of 600p/day outside?

Firstly 40K turned in 45K, but then I managed the client to turn this 40K perm offer into a contract with 350p/day and what is important - outside IR35. The client was desperate to get me on board, so had to play the game on my rules. But that happened only because I did not say "no" to the initial 40K perm offer and went to the interview for curiosity and for the sake of taking interviewing practice, as I always do. The interview went perfectly well and that resulted in this offer conversion.

Not 600 of course as it was pre-Covid, but I am also planning to take a perm from the American time zone in addition to this contract. This perm won't pay too much at all, maybe 55K of perm via their UK-registered office. This perm is my dream job within a dream-team, so basically, I'd be doing whatever I am doing with my pet projects at GitHub (quite popular), so I mostly treat it like a hobby-on-a-daily-schedule plus very good for my CV as this American employer is the platform vendor itself.

Due to the differences in the time zone of 5 hrs, I think it will be easier to combine both works. All the calls and meetings won't intersect in the time.

Not sure how it wil go in real life, but definitely worth of trying as I am not losing anything from this attempt

Are you planning to sleep at all?

[Antman]

Are you planning to sleep at all?

You can sleep when you're dead; until then, let's code!

[MisterLysenkiy]

• you don't have an "other half" spouse, wifey or partner that needs attention or love (isn't that back to front?)
• you have no kids
• you have no pets (e.g. dogs that need walking)
• you live on your own
• you have a grand home office away from it all
• you don't have noisy neighbours

All the quted above is correct. Except for another half who is contracting that same much as I do as for now.

Also, winter is a bad time, with all these limitations/curfews there is still not much left to do. So I'd better focus on building a stronger warchest. I'd probably cut an hour from each of job, as am quite productive and have already automated things well ahead. Maybe even more.

The perm job is coming not from USA (I did not mention states at all), but from Canada and that explains the low pay on it, around GBP 55-60K. I got it because being listed as a top-spec professional directly on the vendor's site, but this time was desperate to find a new gig, so knocked on the vendor's door itself asking for support. Instead, they decided to hire me.

The funny bit is that there is also a 3-rd sweet-and-fat contract coming end of November from the public sector (council) that was tied to my profile, but I won't cope with three of them. I will cynically outsource it to my student, who will be doing things on my behalf. The mid client knows that but cannot deny me doing that, as afraid of losing thу whole council relationship.

At the same time just 2-3 weeks from now I was soo terribly desperate to find at least something as am benched since 31 of March. Such a change in just 3 weeks!!

[MisterLysenkiy]

Are you planning to sleep at all?

Normally in pre-covid times, I slept 5-6 hours per day. 3 hours per day I spent on the commute from Brighton to London and back. Ok, I slept on a train as well, but truly that's not the best quality of sleep. Also deduct 60-90 minutes for a gym per day, run + swimming pool.

Now I don't have that time waste, just left 30 minutes of run and that's it.

But what indeed took much time was reading and learning. at least 2 hrs/day, and temporary I could trade it off

[BigLadFromBeeston666]

Something is definitely going on in public sector right now. Having quite a few chats about roles needing to be filled ASAP.

Not worked in public sector much. Is this usually the time they review and sign off mid-year budgets or something?

Congrats on the gig. I believes it's a combination of their Digital Outcome and Specialists contracts being reviewed and impending IR35 reform. Notably no one has had the nod post April yet, and that's across several vendors (i.e. consultancies that supply people).