Cheaper to hire contractors ??

[tim123]

Re: Sickness

I've told perms to go home because they are sick.

I've seen managers tell cons to go home because they were sick.

This line that dragging yourself into work when you are sick shows commitment is bollux. IMHO It says, "I want the money and I don't give a **** that everyone else is going to be off sick next week because I've spread my germs around"

Tim

[WouldBeEntrepreneur]

Re: Sickness

"pregnancy costs are again a few % (the actual maternity pay that you have to pay is trivial, the major cost is in the potential loss of a key employee, but you have this cost if a key contractor gets pregnant so it can't be seen to be a perm 'overhead'). "

If a perm takes maternity leave, the employer has to keep their job open AND pay them AND pay someone else to do the job.

If a contractor leaves due to maternity then the client ONLY has to replace them.

There is a big difference here both financially and (intangible) organisationally.

[DimPrawn]

Re: Sickness

I've never known a contractor to take more than 1 or 2 days sick during a contract.

I've known many examples where permies are signed off for over a year with back injuries, depression and other vague medical complaints. Often they are on full pay if not half pay for this period.

That costs a company a lot of money and lost productivity.

[zeitghost]

Re: Sickness

You wouldn't say depression is vague if you'd had it....

My least favourite work induced epidemic was chickenpox.

Half the office went down with it.

So did I and it ain't funny at 35...

And I didn't get sick pay coz I'd left by the time the blisters came up.

Couldn't understand why it was so painful when I shaved. I've still got the scars from that.

[tim123]

Re: Maternity and Sickness

You guys are focussing on the extreme cases. To work out the real costs you have to average the costs of the few scroungers with the 99.9% who don't TTP.

1) Maternity pay is 90% of salary for 6 weeks, and then 12 weeks at a max of 100 GBP, as I said trivial for one 40K employee in a company with 100 developers.

2) You don't not have to keep a pregnant person's job 'open'. You have to re-employ them in an 'equivalent' role. I would have thought that for the sort of job that a contractor does, most companies would be glad to have their ex-employee come back after pregnancy and would attribute a zero cost to this. They would however attribute a much higher cost to the re-training of the temporary replacement.

3) I know that many of you guys work in banks that do things like "salary for life" if off sick, but in the sort of company I work for, if you're long term off sick, after 8-10 weeks you get zilch.

4) Even if a company does have a generous sick pay scheme, it is insurable. As an individual you can purchase PHI for what, about 6% of insured salary. I'm sure that a company can get a company-wide insurance at less (though most will self-insure).

As to all the (unsaid) points about companies allowing their perms to play the system. Do you really think that adding a percentage on the "cost of perm" for "Inability of the company's managers to manage their staff efficiently" is going to win you any friends? Yes, I agree with you in many companies there is a cost here, but you *can't* use it, can you? In any case, if the company has a cost attributable to 'crap' managers, it will still have these costs even if all of the perm developers were replaced by cons.

Tim

[Vetran]

Re: Maternity and Sickness

factor in : redundancy, unfair dismissal / employment claims, training / staff development.

[Work2Live]

I have read with interest all the posts on this discussion. My pennyworth, for what it's worth, having been a contractor for 15 years and more recently a hirer of both permies and contractors is that the main reason for hiring contractors is not a financial one. It's a matter of flexibility, your ability to hit the ground running. Basically it's all about efficient resource management; meeting short-term objectives with minimum hassle and hitting deadlines- even if contractors do cost more [short term] its irrelevant when factored in to the cost of missing deadlines in many cases and that has to be factored in. Not sure if that helps you but thats my position as a 'Manager' [please don't all boo at once!- I am an veteran ex-freelancer too].

- Ben@work2live