Large Indian Consultancies/IT Companies

[MrMarkyMark]

Caste systems - there's more than one.

OK, please elaborate

India's caste system is among the world's oldest forms of surviving social stratification. The BBC explains its complexities.

The system which divides Hindus into rigid hierarchical groups based on their karma (work) and dharma (the Hindi word for religion, but here it means duty) is generally accepted to be more than 3,000 years old.

What is India's caste system? - BBC News

[blossom]

No, you should have dealt with it there and then. Nothing to do with alarm bells. It's not uncommon for this to be in contracts nowadays.. Oddly enough it's in there due to contractors leaving mid way through... Funny that innit.....

I did deal with it there and then - I negotiated a 4 week notice period..I',m now in that notice period and leaving

What I'm saying is, I should have recognised the reason behind that clause being there is the first place

[northernladuk]

I did deal with it there and then - I negotiated a 4 week notice period..I',m now in that notice period and leaving

What I'm saying is, I should have recognised the reason behind that clause being there is the first place

So is it a better place because you negotiated the clause?

I'm not so sure a no notice contract equating to a bad gig is sound reasoning.

[blossom]

Thing is if it's in a contract you automatically think the client is a poor/bad one.

So it's a catch 22.

I totally agree with that. I very rarely leave contracts half way through and I've never seen it in a contract.

Actually - when it came through, I had it checked over by QDOS and they told me to get rid of it as it would be terrible for IR35, so I did.

Northernlad, realistically, companies shouldn't have to tie people into a six month contract to make them stay, it smacks of a high attrition rate. In these circumstances they should be a little more introspective and see that they need to try and fix the problems that make everyone run out of the door as soon as they get there, otherwise they lose good people. People who can just chose to leave because they know they wont have trouble getting a job elsewhere.

[blossom]

So is it a better place because you negotiated the clause?

I'm not so sure a no notice contract equating to a bad gig is sound reasoning.

It points to a history of many people leaving within their contract.

Either the client is making poor hiring choices, or its a crap place to work.

Someone thought that clause through for a reason.

[northernladuk]

It points to a history of many people leaving within their contract.

Either the client is making poor hiring choices, or its a crap place to work.

Someone thought that clause through for a reason.

Contractors do leave clients in the lurch to chase the dollah or other personal reasons. Stick around long enough and I'll bet you see more contractors asking about how to leave early than being binned early by clients etc.

Just food for thought.

[yetanotherbob]

The problem is, they ruined things so bad that similar practices might have been adopted by others now. I hope this is not the case - if the contracting world moves to selling "solutions" or "subscriptions" instead of labour.

It also gave a very bad name to Indian IT professionals, simply because these companies overrepresented sub-par talent who willingly subjected themselves to abuse - managements in the US (and UK) went along with it.

This whole business model of leveraging currency/PPP arbitrage and mark-up on other peoples' labour (often achieved by abusive tactics as mentioned earlier in this thread) is wrong on so many levels and I do not consider myself a socialist at all!

Although in India it provided employment to many people in the last decade or two, big outsourcers did not create things of sustainable value. The "onsite" gravy train and higher pay (by Indian standards) that went with it isn't going to last long anyway and the bubble might be bursting.

What did create good IP and technical foundations for sustained growth for India are slow and steady public sector organisations that worked specifically for Indian projects (space research, defence, universal ID scheme that will allow people previously excluded from the organised financial system to receive direct government support etc.).

My post might not help OP in the immediate term, except with insights from first hand experience from the "other" side (working for an offshore company in India for 2 years fresh out of university about 10 years ago).
Quickness (sic) and poor quality was encouraged - giving the impression of spending a lot of time/extra hours was encouraged as opposed to producing actual value - because the real money spinner is "man-days" (sic) sold and not good quality software that provides business value.
The US managers had an attitude of micro-management and an element of smugness at having saved x% per man-day (sic) by moving a job offshore. No one was respected as a professional - because the professional output wasn't the thing being monetised in the first place - it was merely a bum on seat with some keywords on CV for X hours -
which is how I knew I had to get out of this.
(somethings I get the impression that a lot of these practices are cloaked under the garb of agile these days - contrary to the true spirit of agile of course)

If you do a search - and yes you have to go via Google - you will find this question has been answered a few times.

In short the answer is - DO NOT TAKE IT

There are a few tricks they use against contractors which is mentioned in the threads -
1. Getting rid of you when there is an India (cheaper) resource who they say can take your place mid-way through the contract, and/or,
2. Withholding invoice payment from you often for months, and/or,
3. Blaming you for everything that goes wrong with the project, and/or,
4. Making your life hell in other ways.

I know from working alongside Indian developers, testers etc on different contracts a lot of the individuals are nice but unfortunately their management is not. Even if you don't have anything to do with them if you happen to be on a site where their management comes in, you can see and overhear them bullying their staff as they don't always speak in Hindi.

[blossom]

Contractors do leave clients in the lurch to chase the dollah or other personal reasons. Stick around long enough and I'll bet you see more contractors asking about how to leave early than being binned early by clients etc.

Just food for thought.

I'm sure they do, I've been contracting for 15 years and have seen it. High attrition rates happen more often in and environment where management is pretty poor, so they are better fixing that than putting into a clause.

However, as I say though - its really not good to enter into such a contract for IR35...

Here you go...this is what QDOS actually said initially having reviewed my contract:

12(b) (i)
That you are able to terminate the contract before completion of the
services is excellent for IR35. HMRC can argue that a mutuality of
obligation exists during a lengthy notice period, but a notice period of
30 days or less is acceptable.



They misread the 'no notice period' to mean that I didn;t have to give notice and could bugger off any time I liked. I discussed with them and they confirmed it actually meant the opposite - but the above comment still stands.

So if you are signing contracts willnilly with this clause in it, think over the MOO consequences...

[rocktronAMP]

Sigh...I wish I had joined this forum and asked this question a few months ago. I asked this question to see if my situation was common, and appears so.

I did join one - no names mentioned, but anyone who saw my earlier thread will know what I mean now...I can't believe how naive I was.

It's an absolute sweatshop, and yes I have seen, and been on the end of instances of bullying.

Ah..ha! So this wouldn't be HSBC in Canary Wharf then. Base on what you just said and some communications in my network, I think now it could be Lloyd's Banking Group or Royal Bank of Scotland. Both of them did the outsource thing and I believe this is WIPRO.

[blossom]

Ah..ha! So this wouldn't be HSBC in Canary Wharf then. Base on what you just said and some communications in my network, I think now it could be Lloyd's Banking Group or Royal Bank of Scotland. Both of them did the outsource thing and I believe this is WIPRO.

I'm saying nothing...

In fact, Im worried about this being so identifiable that people may guess, but like markymark says - it really could be any of them in any bank!