Exclusion Clause - How tight are they?

[XLMonkey]

Has anyone experience of having a contract lapse then go through another agency but at the same client. What is the position of the original agency in terms of the new contract and can they pursue for lost earnings? Does anyone have a similar experience?

Regards, John.

Your company can be sued, if the contract allows it. The courts do not generally strike down restraint of trade clauses in contracts between limited companies.

You can't be sued as an individual, regardless of what the contract says. The courts generally DO strike down resraint of trade clauses between a company and an individual.

The client could also be sued, depending on the contract they have. In practice, the agent is unlikely to do this if they want any repeat business.

the safe(est) way out of this is to set up a new limited company and contract through that. The agent has no power to pursue the new company. It has a notional power to sue the old company if it can prove that you intended to do this when you signed the original contract. It probably can't

if you continue to use your existing company, then it can be sued, so you're taking the risk.

[DodgyAgent]

opt how you like

I agree with mailman. As an agency it does not matter a flying fig whether the contractor is opting in or opting out. If there is extra admin then we just get on with it and if a contractor goes direct than a relationship has broken down somewhere along the line that no amount of legal sabre rattling wil rescue.

If you want to know what sort of contractor mailman is, he is one of those twatty ones from NZ

[DodgyAgent]

A candidate opting in would mean no more time spent on admin for me. (to answer who ever made that point)

Opting in means you would appear as an employee of X. Why would you be a contractor if you were to appear as an employee????/ PAYE - all well and good if you are temping in an office or factory and you want to be entitled to the same as perm employees.

I believe the PCG lobbied government so you guys could opt out of the regs - Its contractors who lobbied in order to be able to opt out of them and keep contracting alive. People spouting garbage about opting in is against what the PCG (your own body) recommend....

From the view of a client - there is a few reasons why they use a contractor...one of which is so they are free of the obligations they have to a perm employee - If you opt in the client is potentially exposed to action against them from you.

I would like to refer this back to the thread re public schoolboys. There are a lot of people who went through the state education system in the eighties and early nineties who were taught using some sort of modern techniques. One of the side effects of these is that no one was taught to spell correctly.

I do not meaan this in a nasty way because it could well be that my esteemed fellow agent suffers from dyslexia, but if not I will wager that he did not attend either a public school or a top grammar school and that he was educated during the eighties/nineties

[DodgyAgent]

"meaan" Dodgy?

My fingers are too fat for the keyboard, which given the distance between the "a" and the "n" means "not just slightly overweight"

[IT contract agent]

dodgy -

Absolute garbage again! - If a contractor opts in then it leaves the agency with less comeback if the contractor goes direct with the end client.

Re my education in the eighties - what the hell - I'm a young...rich guy with lexdyxia!

[DodgyAgent]

dodgy -

Absolute garbage again! - If a contractor opts in then it leaves the agency with less comeback if the contractor goes direct with the end client.

Re my education in the eighties - what the hell - I'm a young...rich guy with lexdyxia!

I have no doubt that you are successful, and good on you that you are. It goes to show that you dont necessarily need a knobby education or the ability to write a literary classic to get on in this world. I was more criticising the state system than having a go at you.

Anyway my point about opting in or out is that my own agency does not bother. If a contractor ends up going direct then the relationship has gone wrong to the extent that rattling lawyers would be too late a resolution.

The problem with a lot of agencies is that they have become so hung up on process etc etc that they no longer build the relationships with the clients and contractors. Everything is done from behind a desk so these people become obsessed with control and minimising admin work in order to improve productivity.

On the other hand if you are dealing with a lot of small fly by night software companies or builders then I can understand the need to nail these contracts down. We on the other hand (wishing to sound superior) only deal with "blue chips"

[~Craig~]

isn't it funny that nearly every role on jobserve is for a 'bluechip' company? It seems to be banded around so frequently these days I'm sure many agents don't even know what it means.

Dodgy - Before you say anything I'm not having a dig a you, it's just a general observation

[IT contract agent]

dodgy - do you know what a blue chip company is? According to Jobserve 2 out of 3 jobs are for blue chips.

Re recruitment for blue chips.....you will end up like spring! making losses. - I will happily work with them if they paid the rates however they often work with organisations who charge single figure margins. Now working on PSLs mean I have to, more than most, build and maintain relationships with clients and candidates! I imagine you either work for a small start up taking business regardless of rates or contract or work for somebody like spring - although I can't believe any company of any size doesn't worry about what’s in the contract.

Re my education - I've 11 GCSEs all A and B....5 A-Levels...a Bsc...and an Msc...

[hyperD]

5 A-Levels?

Not going to add anything to this thread but simply curious - I'm assuming you are not 30+ as I (being an old git) don't remember having the option of doing 5 A-levels?

Is that what is possible nowadays?

[OrangeHopper]

Doesn't the word 'GCSE' give it away?