How hot is the market for contractors in London?

[tegan]

Hi there, I'm reaching out as I am moving to London after contracting as a Digital BA in New Zealand for the last 5-6 years. I have around 10 years experience and was hoping you would be able to assist me by confirming what the contracting market is currently like for Senior Digital BA's who comes from an Agile/Banking background with Product Owner experience. I have worn the hat of PO, BA and SCRUM Master depending on the need of the assignment and have all the required qualifications and certifications in these areas.

I have found is really easy to find new assignments in NZ as they have a serious skills shortage in the Business Analysis domain but I am unsure if the market is the same in London.

Any help in this regard would be much appreciated. Thanks a mil, Tegan

[TheDude]

I can't comment on rates but most of the banks I have worked for are very hot on agile so you should find something.

[mogga71]

Hi there, I'm reaching out as I am moving to London after contracting as a Digital BA in New Zealand for the last 5-6 years. I have around 10 years experience and was hoping you would be able to assist me by confirming what the contracting market is currently like for Senior Digital BA's who comes from an Agile/Banking background with Product Owner experience. I have worn the hat of PO, BA and SCRUM Master depending on the need of the assignment and have all the required qualifications and certifications in these areas.

I have found is really easy to find new assignments in NZ as they have a serious skills shortage in the Business Analysis domain but I am unsure if the market is the same in London.

Any help in this regard would be much appreciated. Thanks a mil, Tegan

From my own experiences of late it seems that we are now in the era of multi skilled and disciplined devs being expected to do absolutely everything ..... we don't recruit specific BA's, Scrum masters, Agile Devs, Prod Support specialists etc. any more... we expect the modern dev to do all of it. I kid you not.

[oliverson]

Hi there, I'm reaching out as I am moving to London after contracting as a Digital BA in New Zealand for the last 5-6 years. I have around 10 years experience and was hoping you would be able to assist me by confirming what the contracting market is currently like for Senior Digital BA's who comes from an Agile/Banking background with Product Owner experience. I have worn the hat of PO, BA and SCRUM Master depending on the need of the assignment and have all the required qualifications and certifications in these areas.

I have found is really easy to find new assignments in NZ as they have a serious skills shortage in the Business Analysis domain but I am unsure if the market is the same in London.

Any help in this regard would be much appreciated. Thanks a mil, Tegan

It's great if you like paying half your income in tax due to the IR35 reforms. Hence the reason I no longer contract in the London IB sector and tbh, I'm a lot happier (and richer) for it!

[northernladuk]

I can't comment on rates but most of the banks I have worked for are very hot on agile so you should find something.

But are all inside IR35

[Smartie]

Basically my skillset and area, though I have more years of experience than I'd care to admit.

Haven't had any issues finding contracts bar the start of Covid.

Rates vary greatly but have pushed up a bit to compensate for IR35 which you'll almost certainly end up within due to big clients risk aversion.

Put what you can into a pension and you can make 70%+ take home overall.

[Smartie]

From my own experiences of late it seems that we are now in the era of multi skilled and disciplined devs being expected to do absolutely everything ..... we don't recruit specific BA's, Scrum masters, Agile Devs, Prod Support specialists etc. any more... we expect the modern dev to do all of it. I kid you not.

That was the original idea in Scrum.

Unfortunately, Devs who can do those roles (well) are as rare as something that's very rare indeed. In any case they usually don't want to undertake what are very different roles with very different skillsets.

Easy to find specific roles.

[NowPermOutsideUK]

Basically my skillset and area, though I have more years of experience than I'd care to admit.

Haven't had any issues finding contracts bar the start of Covid.

Rates vary greatly but have pushed up a bit to compensate for IR35 which you'll almost certainly end up within due to big clients risk aversion.

Put what you can into a pension and you can make 70%+ take home overall.

Could you expand on that ? If you are inside IR35 you are limited to how much you can put into the pension. How do you get a 70% take home pay?

[Rik1087]

The market has steadily increased over the last 6-9 months. The need for Business Analysts has massively improved, as you probably know, and akin to a comment on here, views on whether a projects needs business analysts or not tend to go up and down. But if projects tend to think a Developer or a PM can do the role, they quickly realize they need the correct resource!

I can't comment too much on banking, as my sector is Insurance. If you were open to changing sectors, as Digital lends itself across both, then there are a lot of opportunities in Lloyd's of London, who are in the middle of a 5-8 year digital drive. They are pretty desperate for BA's and many will take resource from other sectors.

Roles in the London Market are predominantly outside IR35, and can expect daily rates of between 550-650. If inside, then they sit around 650-750 per day.

Outside of the London Market & reinsurance, and looking at General Insurers you are predominantly looking at inside roles, as they already have PO's SM's & BA's but just not enough of them, but can't warrant calling it an outside role as not specialized enough. Their rates for an inside role are slightly lower though at around 550 inside.

If you wanted to stay in banking, I can't envision an issue with securing a BA role, like i said they're in demand, like wise scrum masters. PO tend to be rare, as they usually use a permanent client resource for that role as they tend to know the business more.

Good luck in the move and search!

[Smartie]

Could you expand on that ? If you are inside IR35 you are limited to how much you can put into the pension. How do you get a 70% take home pay?

You aren't limited on how much you can put into a pension.
You are limited on how much you can contribute without paying tax on it - £40k/year
Exception - if you've been a member of a pension scheme for the past three years you can top up contributions for those years to the maximum £120k
Because of this you could be contributing, say, £60k per year.

Very rough example, PAYE £120k salary, £40k pension contribution, approx. take home £50k + pension = £90k, £75% (listentotaxman.com)
If you're outside IR35 your £40k contribution costs you £24k as it reduces corporation tax payable. I was making around 70% total when doing that.

You can't get at the pension until age 55 so it partly depends on your age as to how likely you are to do this, but it's the best tax break you'll get.