Day Rates Down

[contractorinatractor]

There seems to be a worrying trend that day rates for architects and senior experts in our various IT fields are remaining static and down, in real terms, particularly when trends for the past seven years are examined.

How are you finding rates outside of London? £500/day is still common, which doesn't bode well given that an average senior role could fetch around this mark five to seven years ago. There's a real containment in the market for rates and I've noticed it's a struggle to achieve £600/day outside of London without entering into a senior management role with its associated long hours and responsibility. I'm lucky that I still have the contacts to get a higher rate, but I've noticed some friends packing the game in.

Inflation and cost of living are eroding my take home and I'm not enthused about an imagined future brexit effect which will surely compound the negatives.

Any thoughts on your own experience?

[oliverson]

There seems to be a worrying trend that day rates for architects and senior experts in our various IT fields are remaining static and down, in real terms, particularly when trends for the past seven years are examined.

How are you finding rates outside of London? £500/day is still common, which doesn't bode well given that an average senior role could fetch around this mark five to seven years ago. There's a real containment in the market for rates and I've noticed it's a struggle to achieve £600/day outside of London without entering into a senior management role with its associated long hours and responsibility. I'm lucky that I still have the contacts to get a higher rate, but I've noticed some friends packing the game in.

Inflation and cost of living are eroding my take home and I'm not enthused about an imagined future brexit effect which will surely compound the negatives.

Any thoughts on your own experience?

As a developer I'm seeing rates improve in the north but I was on £ 450 fourteen years ago. Rates are only just around that now! £ 450 back in 2004 was a lot of money. According to sites like this Historical UK inflation rates and calculator, it would be £ 675 today. Zero expenses back then as well. No wonder I went crazy buying flash cars and holiday homes.

But I do see the difference between northern rates and London rates much narrower than it used to be (and house prices much wider)

[contractorinatractor]

There remain a few lucrative contracts in London but they are few and far between.

Edinburgh seems to offer a better lifestyle than London and rates are on par there.

With ERelief soon to likely disappear I am considering winding things down soon. Many former clients balk at my request for £650/day outside of London because they say they can hire someone desperate for £500/day. I'm usually brought in to clear up the ensuing mess, but I can't rely on that forever and am saddened to see decent gigs go to chumps at the aforementioned rate.

Inflation-proof we should be on £1k/day if we're any good. The only roles I see for this are CIO-level. The market has changed, as is indicated by the 160 page "State of the Market" thread in this forum.

[uk contractor]

In the 1990s I was taking home around £80K PA so yes rates have dropped steadily! Its now a race to the bottom ever since the credit crunch if you include inflation then many rates are a lot lower. Supply & demand also means you are now competing with a huge number of contractors & many of these will be p1mped out by the Tier 2 Visa specialists operating in the UK (via Mumbai or Bangalore!). Most UK Born IT resource cannot possibly compete or why should they even attempt to when your being undercut by these Tier 2 Visa holders. They are happy to work in the UK for £200 a week doing IT work which previously rate carded around the £500 a day mark. The slack from them is taken up by EU workers from the mainland EU coming from places where there is minimal employment so once again they are happy to be exploited & paid £300-400 a week on average (these numbers are based on people who I have come across on various sites in the financial services sector in other sectors its probably even lower).

Brexit will sort some of this out naturally & the UK Contract market should see some upturn perhaps Q2 next year. USA have drastically restricted Tier 2 Visa numbers to give their own workers a chance. UK should as well (but does not have anyone) who champions the patriotic job protectionism stance USA have for instance!

[theroyale]

In the 1990s I was taking home around £80K PA so yes rates have dropped steadily! Its now a race to the bottom ever since the credit crunch if you include inflation then many rates are a lot lower. Supply & demand also means you are now competing with a huge number of contractors & many of these will be p1mped out by the Tier 2 Visa specialists operating in the UK (via Mumbai or Bangalore!). Most UK Born IT resource cannot possibly compete or why should they even attempt to when your being undercut by these Tier 2 Visa holders. They are happy to work in the UK for £200 a week doing IT work which previously rate carded around the £500 a day mark. The slack from them is taken up by EU workers from the mainland EU coming from places where there is minimal employment so once again they are happy to be exploited & paid £300-400 a week on average (these numbers are based on people who I have come across on various sites in the financial services sector in other sectors its probably even lower).

Brexit will sort some of this out naturally & the UK Contract market should see some upturn perhaps Q2 next year. USA have drastically restricted Tier 2 Visa numbers to give their own workers a chance. UK should as well (but does not have anyone) who champions the patriotic job protectionism stance USA have for instance!

Not sure about that. Migration Advisory Committee (a body that Tory government tends to listen to) has said today that as a result of curbing EU migration Britain should post Brexit (1) rely more on non EU migration, and (2) more worryingly, completely remove the cap on high skilled ie tier 2 workers

[Syd]

Cloud Engineer and DevOps rates are rising though.

[uk contractor]

Not sure about that. Migration Advisory Committee (a body that Tory government tends to listen to) has said today that as a result of curbing EU migration Britain should post Brexit (1) rely more on non EU migration, and (2) more worryingly, completely remove the cap on high skilled ie tier 2 workers

Its no big surprise is it as there is absolutely no-one who champions this cause just a bunch of wealthy globalists who want to see cheap workforce remain forever as it boosts their profits & massively reduces operating costs overall.

If you removed ALL Tier 2 IT Visa workers from UK overnight I doubt there would be any credible skills shortages anywhere. The only issue this would cause is for recruitment agencies who would lose their access to easy profits via exploitation & have to pay most of the rate to contractors again like they used to!

[Scruff]

Cloud Engineer and DevOps rates are rising tough.

Agreed - for "proper Cloud" (vCD / vRA / vRO / AWS . Azure) not rebadged Virtualisation.

[Eirikur]

Rates for my line of business peaked November last year and have dropped significantly since

[LondonManc]

North v London rates vary - I've seen £400 up north v £450 in London then other times £310 up north v £600 in London. Very much seems to vary from client to client at times.