State of the Market

[Bluenose]

Joined first time contracting in sept 2023 after being permi for 18yrs (outside ir35, £650)... got increment in daily rates in between. Now client is asking everyone to go inside IR35! Any known issues before the discussion time comes? joining as employee may also on the table .. what should I factor in (tax implications etc) and what could be potential perm salary?

Start another thread but you need to leave your current role and not go back to that workplace, even as a permie. And I would change your posting name on here, if that is anyway related to your real name.

State of the market update: I can see alot of permie movement in linkedin, in years previous that would translate into contract market movement eventually, but this time around I am not so sure. SaaS Platform specific related roles for example like, Salesforce/ServiceNOW, there was a big boom in this roles but I think they have been now nearshored and offshored at much lower cost and are not coming back.

[SchumiStars]

This is the Indian consultancy - right? I cancelled an interview with them when they backtracked on hybrid working arrangements.

Should have cancelled but it's more practise. This job will be filled by someone internal to HCL, a permi, I would imagine, after going to the market.

The indian consultanices are in every area of the market driving down the costs. They quote cheap, win the business so then offer cheap contracts to the market in order to maintain margin.

Unless the demand pickups we can get used to high pressure, low wages for a while.

This is the state of the market.

[oliverson]

currently on £600/day outside, fully remote.
old pal called me.

Nice one.

Similar thing happened to me this morning, a possibility of some work with an old pal of mine. I'll know more next week. Fingers crossed on this one.

[SussexSeagull]

I don't think I have ever ridiculed people for taking a low paid gig to see them through - everyone who works deserves respect.

What I probably said was something along the lines that some people who have repeatedly failed to land new contracts may have overestimated their skills and abilities or need to reassess their position in the workplace. Just because you have earned a decent whack as a contractor in the past does not mean you will be at the front of the queue when/if the market picks up.

If that came across as smug or condescending then I apologise.

I am certainly reassessing my place in the marketplace. My main skill was well paid and in demand. It has dramatically fallen out of favour over the past 18 months and it is quite clear to me that I need to leverage my experience whilst gaining/regaining skills that are more in demand. It is highly likely that any next role is likely to be initially much lower paid. IR35 status is likely to be the least of my worries for quite some time and I suspect the same applies to many else on these forums.

I think the current situation has forced most of us to reappraise our place in the industry. For what it is worth I doubt it is one thing that has caused you and many others to fall out of favour and I doubt your main skill has become obsolete in the last 18 months.

In related news I got through a values based interview for a permanent role. Which is a sign I have learnt to talk a game over 17 years of contracting

[TheDude]

I think the current situation has forced most of us to reappraise our place in the industry. For what it is worth I doubt it is one thing that has caused you and many others to fall out of favour and I doubt your main skill has become obsolete in the last 18 months.

In related news I got through a values based interview for a permanent role. Which is a sign I have learnt to talk a game over 17 years of contracting

My main skill is Scala. It is not obsolete but has fallen out of favour because companies do not trust those who control the language.

[willendure]

These parasites again....

Senior Software Engineer

Edinburgh, ML - 225.0
Contract
Posted by: eTeam Workforce Limited
Posted: Wednesday, 9 July 2025


List of skills as long as your arm including over 5+ years experience and Machine Learning, all for the princely sum of £ 225.

We couldn't find a UK person, so now we need a tier 2 visa....

[SchumiStars]

This is the Indian consultancy - right? I cancelled an interview with them when they backtracked on hybrid working arrangements.

We couldn't find a UK person, so now we need a tier 2 visa....

They are undercutting the entire UK workforce and pulling in more immigrants on visas. This has to stop.

These agencies are ruining the market.

If they didn't undercut everyone, if they paid the going UK rates we might stand a chance. However with more and more companies choosing them instead of contractors, it is not going to end well for anyone.

The only people who are likely to make any money are the external agencies.

As expected, interview with HCL, indian agency went nowhere. Although all the tech questions were answered correctly.

[oliverson]

They are undercutting the entire UK workforce and pulling in more immigrants on visas. This has to stop.

These agencies are ruining the market.

If they didn't undercut everyone, if they paid the going UK rates we might stand a chance. However with more and more companies choosing them instead of contractors, it is not going to end well for anyone.

The only people who are likely to make any money are the external agencies.

As expected, interview with HCL, indian agency went nowhere. Although all the tech questions were answered correctly.

Going to end up pretty nicely for them!

[willendure]

I don't think it is so much a question of skills becoming irrelevant - although with Scala or any specific technology there are always going to be phases of going in and out of popularity. Personally I enjoyed working with Scala, but I do feel as a language it is too large, a strength or a weakness I guess depending on how you see things.

I think it is more a question of skills being commoditized. So you could write Java in 2001? That put you within a small and highly sought after group of people. Now any old hacker can do it. Not only that but it isn't the hot new skill we all want on our CVs at the same time as people in cheaper parts of the world are quite happy to learn a clunky old technology that will pay their bills and handsomely too!

I think covid and working from home also has played a role. Once businesses got comfortable with the idea of never seeing their employees, it was only a small step to being fine with them being on the end of a teams call whilst located in the indian sub-continent. So we had off-shoring for a long time before covid, I just think it accelerated the trend.

Interestingly Java is part of the reason I have my current role - I am not writing any but the client has a lot of Java code in their systems and to design new features I need to read a lot of Java. Fortunately 20 years of writing it means I can instinctively find my way around a Java project and understand quickly what I need to know.

The trick is going to be to learn new skills. Things that will put you in a "small and highly sought after group of people".

I think the other big issue is money. Interest rates are relatively high and governments are in debt. So both are tightening their belts at the same time. I used to see a lot of adverts for contractors for public sector work, and I feel like now I hardly see any.

[avonleigh]

They are undercutting the entire UK workforce and pulling in more immigrants on visas. This has to stop.

These agencies are ruining the market.

If they didn't undercut everyone, if they paid the going UK rates we might stand a chance. However with more and more companies choosing them instead of contractors, it is not going to end well for anyone.

The only people who are likely to make any money are the external agencies.

As expected, interview with HCL, indian agency went nowhere. Although all the tech questions were answered correctly.

It isn't going to stop though. Been going on for last twenty years. Only reason it's more obvious now is because the market is so poor, so noticing it more. Both Labour and Conservatives allowed it to happen.