IR35 and interviews

[jamesbrown]

Yes that is exactly what the client wants. My technical knowledge is required to assess the candidates.

Yeah, I would avoid that if it isn't captured in your SoW (leniently interpreted is OK) because that is a substantive effort, not just an opinion. Always try to help the customer, but always stick within the broad outlines of your SoW, else get a mod to update the SoW, assuming it is acceptable to you.

[cannon999]

Yeah, I would avoid that if it isn't captured in your SoW (leniently interpreted is OK) because that is a substantive effort, not just an opinion. Always try to help the customer, but always stick within the broad outlines of your SoW, else get a mod to update the SoW, assuming it is acceptable to you.

So my options are:

1. Update the contract to include this.
2. Do this for free as a favour to the client outside of the contract and not charge for it.

Which option is better do you think for IR35? I am not bothered about the money.

[northernladuk]

So my options are:

1. Update the contract to include this.
2. Do this for free as a favour to the client outside of the contract and not charge for it.

Which option is better do you think for IR35? I am not bothered about the money.

Must admit I'm not totally in agreement with JB here. Your technical knowledge is what you are being paid for so to apply it to the product you are working on and the ongoing support of it isn't that far apart. If the brief is to deliver X in to BAU then it is easily arguable this could involve resourcing for that BAU phase. Dropping a working technical solution isn't delivering a product in to BAU. I guess that is because I'm a service operations guy so finishing a bit of code isn't delivering a service to a customer.

My question would be how much time/effort is required to do this? Will it be a noteable time eater or are you just spending a couple of hours sifting CV's and interviewing to give the client a recommendation.

I think either option above is perfectly acceptable. A line in the SOW saying something like 'Consultancy activities to enable delivery of product in to service' will cover this and many other potential activities.

If it's a one off thing that won't take a lot of time then I think option 2 is also perfectly acceptable but what do you mean by free outside contract? If that means you provide eight hours work and give them three more hours for free then I'd have to think about it. If you deliver five hours in a day and spend the rest of the day doing this activity and still bill for a day then yes fine.

Option 1 is the IR35 safe route but chances of a case coming up because you've interviewed someone is next to zero and carrying out one simple activity such as this has never been brought up in a case so at worst is a very minor flag. If you are being as cautious as you are about IR35 I'd say this activity becomes almost irrelevant to any IR35 risks.

But as has been mentioned already, if the client has determined you outside then it doesn't matter. It's their risk anyway.

[cannon999]

Must admit I'm not totally in agreement with JB here. Your technical knowledge is what you are being paid for so to apply it to the product you are working on and the ongoing support of it isn't that far apart. If the brief is to deliver X in to BAU then it is easily arguable this could involve resourcing for that BAU phase. Dropping a working technical solution isn't delivering a product in to BAU. I guess that is because I'm a service operations guy so finishing a bit of code isn't delivering a service to a customer.

My question would be how much time/effort is required to do this? Will it be a noteable time eater or are you just spending a couple of hours sifting CV's and interviewing to give the client a recommendation.

I think either option above is perfectly acceptable. A line in the SOW saying something like 'Consultancy activities to enable delivery of product in to service' will cover this and many other potential activities.

If it's a one off thing that won't take a lot of time then I think option 2 is also perfectly acceptable but what do you mean by free outside contract? If that means you provide eight hours work and give them three more hours for free then I'd have to think about it. If you deliver five hours in a day and spend the rest of the day doing this activity and still bill for a day then yes fine.

Option 1 is the IR35 safe route but chances of a case coming up because you've interviewed someone is next to zero and carrying out one simple activity such as this has never been brought up in a case so at worst is a very minor flag. If you are being as cautious as you are about IR35 I'd say this activity becomes almost irrelevant to any IR35 risks.

But as has been mentioned already, if the client has determined you outside then it doesn't matter. It's their risk anyway.

Small company - determination lies with me.

It's minimal effort really. By free I mean I don't invoice for any of this 'extra' time at all. I don't have a working day currently so I work whenever I want. So the time I spend on doing this I simply wouldn't bill for it.

Thank you for your advice.

[GhostofTarbera]

Thoughts? If a client wants my opinion re new hires how does that sit with the IR35 legislation? To be honest same goes for 'helping' juniors with work. I am here to deliver software - nothing else is written into my contract. Would you refuse?

yes it’s your opportunity to weed out all the superstars and hire the dross to protect your income stream

[Paralytic]

yes it’s your opportunity to weed out all the superstars and hire the dross to protect your income stream

This isn't the thread for you to be looking for a new role.

[jamesbrown]

So my options are:

1. Update the contract to include this.
2. Do this for free as a favour to the client outside of the contract and not charge for it.

Which option is better do you think for IR35? I am not bothered about the money.

As I said earlier, I don't think either is massively important w/r to IR35 and I don't think the money makes any difference because it's about your working practices, but I wouldn't do substantive things outwith the SoW because it's a slippery slope. You will have to make that judgement ("substantial", "outwith") yourself. But I also don't think (2) is mitigation w/r to IR35 if that's what you're asking.

[jamesbrown]

Your technical knowledge is what you are being paid for

If that were true, then the SoW would say "we are paying you for your technical knowledge and we can direct and control your daily tasks as we see fit". I doubt that is true; I hope for the OP it isn't true. I think they are (or should be) paying the OP for the tasks identified in the SoW, the delivery of which relies on the OP's skillset.

But, yeah, sure, there's always a balance to be struck. Don't let IR35 wag the dog. You do want happy customers and repeat business and all legitimate businesses aim for that. Like I said earlier, it's easy to miss the wood for the trees w/r to IR35 - just keep on the right side of the big ticket items, which you will be doing anyway in a B2B relationship.