State of the Market

[hungry_hog]

My (dreadful) plan B last time was out tutoring (around 50ph) and selling unnecessary tat on eBay- that brought a few K a month - not enough to live on but slowed the rate of attrition whilst on bench. It is probably worse than what General Melchett from Blackadder GF would come up with.

Almost everyone I contracted with (18 years, 7 clients, over 200 people) is now perm, emigrated or retired, I reckon less than 10 standing!

May be ex contractors will end up off grid, mumbling about PL SQL and test track pro?

[Bluenose]

What’s everyone’s plan B?

Rate is v mediocre too but given commitments I’ve got to work…otherwise I’d have thrown the towel in retired abroad and do odd bits & pieces…we toyed with Turkey might still do it…I know someone who retired there…great food and weather and not expensive to live compared to here if you have savings …

Agadir, Morocco is on GMT and would be my preference if I had to leave the EU+Swiss behind but remain on a similar timezone.

In terms of Plan B, theres plenty of work going in the U.S and Aus but I were on the bench for over 6 months now I would be looking at where the money is going in tech and retrain, take a muppet role to learn the ropes in that area and then work my way back up.

[Fraidycat]

My (dreadful) plan B last time was out tutoring (around 50ph) and selling unnecessary tat on eBay-

Your eBay reference reminded me of this poor chap in the US:

https://fortune.com/2025/05/14/softw...in-rv-trailer/


Can anyone who posts on this thread beat 800 applications?

I would guess some members who post on this thread have been benched for 800+ days now . So that would equate to just one application per day (if you include weekends)

[oliverson]

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I personally think the contracting market is now permentaly dead. There will be contracts but few and far between.
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I agree with this. I don't think the market ever will return to how it was, certainly not to the level required to sustain how people have probably shaped their finances and lives. I'm one of those people.

My business model was built around c. 240 days billable work per year with no breaks and pretty much no holiday, aside from those 'forced' upon me. I realise now, looking back, that this wasn't a great idea and I should have factored in more holiday and more contingency for downtime, but hey, for most of my contracting career, there was plenty of work around and no reason to believe that wouldn't always be the case.

So, I've been thinking that everything I built up around this 240 billable days (2 houses, 2 cars, etc) needs a rethink. There isn't, or is unlikely to be, sufficient work, outside IR35, to sustain the lifestyle I've enjoyed these last 20 years. So, my plan would be to sell one house and be mortgage free on the other, with some money in the bank. Go down to just one car, it's all we need really, assuming WFH only roles. Then, plan on just 120 billable days per year. Pay less corp. tax. Still lease a Tesla. Spend the other 120 days doing my own thing, doing things with the missus, the dogs. Without the requirement to work every possible billable day to meet large outgoings, I'm sure life would be much less stressful.

[SchumiStars]

Plan B? Cycle, run, boxing, gym.

I am not really good at anything except computers, software TBH. Never made any money doing anything else in my entire life. So I am screwed.

Second son is due to go uni next year which may give us the option of being foster parents or getting a lodger. Not ideal but needs must.

We could sell the house but in all honesty, its taken me 20years of hard work to get a big detached house in London and id rather try and keep it.

[agentzero]

What’s everyone’s plan B?

The market is dire and these job ads with rates are grim reading…

Leave.

No, really, leave. Real contractors here will have set up a life in the UK and will have ties. You don't have to leave forever, but professional contractors should be willing to move with the times and the market. If the market is this bad, there are a lot of countries nearby that need skills. IT skills are sorely lacking in Iceland, the Netherlands, Luxembourg, Germany, Denmark, Norway, Sweden, Finland. The common language is English, not French, in these countries.

Don't accept less than you are worth. Education is generally better abroad, so much so that you can rely on state schools in these countries. Remember it's not forever and will benefit your children, if you have any, to see another country and practice a new language.

The traffic to this forum is so far down on pre 2020 that you know contracting is only going in one direction. Don't accept a bad market and don't limit yourself based on prejudice of what working in other countries is like. Do it. NotAllThere and co have worked around the world and moved around. Moving isn't abnormal in a depression style market such as what the UK now has.

[agentzero]

Plan B? Cycle, run, boxing, gym.

I am not really good at anything except computers, software TBH. Never made any money doing anything else in my entire life. So I am screwed.

Second son is due to go uni next year which may give us the option of being foster parents or getting a lodger. Not ideal but needs must.

We could sell the house but in all honesty, its taken me 20years of hard work to get a big detached house in London and id rather try and keep it.

My advice is to avoid gaps on your CV. List your Limited Company as the most recent role and its full duration. All projects and learning, get them on the CV worded in a professional way. Embellish but don't lie. I know from experience that gaps aren't favoured by agents, but if you have comfortable chat and are smooth talking you can normally get around short gaps. The best way to stage this is by suggesting lots of smaller pieces of work here and there during gaps, rather than having one main client.

Given the poor market, law of the jungle.

[Smartie]

If you are going to move abroad permanently, worth checking that your UK pension will continue to be uprated with inflation. It isn't in many places.

"The only other countries in which the UK state pension rises in the same way as UK state pensioners are: the European Union countries (which continued after Brexit^[5][6]); Switzerland; Barbados; Bermuda; Bosnia-Herzegovina; Guernsey; Isle of Man; Israel; Jamaica; Jersey; Mauritius; Montenegro; North Macedonia; the Philippines; Serbia; Turkey; and the United States of America.^[7]

Most British Commonwealth countries are in the frozen list;^[8] including Australia, Canada, South Africa, New Zealand, and India, as well as British overseas territories such as the Falkland Islands. Thailand is also on the list.^[9]

Pensioners who return to the UK can get their pension uprated to the full amount by applying to the Department for Work and Pensions, but this rate only applies so long as they are in the UK.^[10]"

[sadkingbilly]

Leave.

No, really, leave. IT skills are sorely lacking in Iceland, the Netherlands, Luxembourg, Germany, Denmark, Norway, Sweden, Finland. The common language is English, not French, in these countries.

.

not so easy after the morons had their day at the polls, though.
NL for one began to ask for 'fluent dutch' ffs. - even the Dutch don't speak 'fluent dutch' *
and why would French be a factor in germanic/scandi countries anyway?

[oliverson]

So, I'm sat at my desk waiting for an agent to call to discuss a role, and that call was scheduled for 90 minutes ago.

The level of professionalism (or lack of) in the recruitment sector is absolutely atrocious.

It's not like this is a one-off either, it's pretty much every single 'lead' I get these days.

Ah well, back to the AI app I'm working on.