Advice Please

[Denny]

I've been on contract for a large multi-national for around 3 months now. My contract was set up and B2B and back-to-back (as confirmed with client, which I saw evidence of). I am also careful to behave as a B2B contractor by working out of my home office most of the time and only visiting the client site when I need to do a face to face. Only stay on site to work if I have two meetings fairly close to each other which wouldn't make it worth my while going home first. However, my name is on the office door which I am not pleased about either.

However, I feel as I'm being dragged into the personal services arena more so now and that my client is viewing my contractual status as supplier as a smokescreen instead of a real own company. He keeps referring to me as a member of a team (which I don't mind if we're talking deliverable outputs whereby working with others is essential to get it done, but now it seems that it extends to how I am being viewed on the programme as a whole (as if I belong to it rather than the programme being a client organisation).

For example, today I got an invite for a meal out 'with the team' next week with my name on a general programme distribution list. I am pretty angry about this because I feel that my company should have been invited on my own e-mail addy which my client knows exists and has corresponded to on a regular basis in the past. I do most of my work on my own computer but do have a company provided laptop for 'network' purposes only (the addy was sent to this laptop address).

How do I handle this? I feel annoyed that I am being treated and considered as an intrinsic member of a team when I have behaved and made clear all along that I am a separate supplier company. I don't even eat in the staff restaurant and come and go as I please like any other external supplier. However, even this is difficult to differentiate as many of the personal service contractors and staff can 'work from home' too (I use the term 'working out of my home office and set my network profile up as a separate business). Clearly, they are not taking my business status seriously enough, if they are doing this, despite all the evidence that I am behaving as a supplier not a team member.

Am I making a fuss over nothing or do I have to be cautious. The programme manager also sends out a holiday fill in sheet each week which so far I have avoided filling in. However, I am on that list too.

Do I ask to be removed from all irrelevant non-deliverable distribution lists that have nothing to do with my work schedule outputs or do I stay quiet and put up with it?

Serious answers only please. I would really appreciate some good, relevant replies from those who work (contract terms and behaviours) as own business contractors genuinely viewed as outside of IR35 who work for large clients on extended contracts.

[MarillionFan]

Fuss over nothing Denny. Chill out otherwise you'll allienate yourself.

[meridian]

I also work for a large blue-chip. Our "team" is made up of a mix of permies, outsourced Indians on-site, outsourced Indians who fly over here for a week or two then fly back home and continue working from there, B2B contractors, agency-provided contractors, and a couple of consultants (IBM, Accenture, that sort of thing).

Everybody is treated the same - team mail lists, access to restaurant/gym, "compulsory" yee-ha-aren't-we-doing-well meetings, leaving drinks, etc etc.

I wouldn't sweat it. As MF says, you might end up alienating yourself and find the contract not being renewed as you're "not a team player".

[hyperD]

Denny - I'm working for multiple blue chip clients all on true B2B direct supplier contracts.

Ironically, I've got a client meeting in an hour so I've got to go...but I'll write some fuller comments later this afternoon.

One quick observation is the fact if you are paid hourly/daily by the client then the PM might think you are simply a contractor working from home. If so, don't sweat it and DEFINITELY don't try and alienate yourself.

Will reply more later...

[Denny]

Denny - I'm working for multiple blue chip clients all on true B2B direct supplier contracts.

Ironically, I've got a client meeting in an hour so I've got to go...but I'll write some fuller comments later this afternoon.

One quick observation is the fact if you are paid hourly/daily by the client then the PM might think you are simply a contractor working from home. If so, don't sweat it and DEFINITELY don't try and alienate yourself.

Will reply more later...

I'm more interested in averting any possibility of an IR investigation with the end client and being caught up in a personal service -v- B2B perception problem.

I am paid a daily professional fee and had Schedule of Works drawn up, no MOO and full rights of substitution. I don't even have client control in the contract. Nevertheless, the IR still see 'actions on site' as being more important than the contract terms themselves. My client has never tried to impose any rules on me about working hours, time allowed at home or anything else that suggest personal service. It's just the 'member of a team' part I am uncomfortable about.

[Denny]

I also work for a large blue-chip. Our "team" is made up of a mix of permies, outsourced Indians on-site, outsourced Indians who fly over here for a week or two then fly back home and continue working from there, B2B contractors, agency-provided contractors, and a couple of consultants (IBM, Accenture, that sort of thing).

Everybody is treated the same - team mail lists, access to restaurant/gym, "compulsory" yee-ha-aren't-we-doing-well meetings, leaving drinks, etc etc.

I wouldn't sweat it. As MF says, you might end up alienating yourself and find the contract not being renewed as you're "not a team player".

Thanks but that puts you squarely in the IR35 inclusion camp, as far as I can see. I am not planning on a strategy based on 'getting away with it' but one of genuine B2B arrangements. Another contractor I work with also works like you and if the IR was a bluebottle on the wall they would conclude very quickly that he was inside not outside of IR35. He uses the staff facilities, using the company phones all the time, uses the company laptop and is only ever off site when he on business abroad. That to me does not consistute a proper B2B arrangment.

[Cowboy Bob]

I'm more interested in averting any possibility of an IR investigation with the end client and being caught up in a personal service -v- B2B perception problem.

As I understand it, the investigations are random anyway, meaning that however you run your business you have a chance of being investigated. This can't be avoided.

What you need to worry about is the potential conclusion of the investigation, which from what you're saying, doesn't seem like a problem. Say you've got a building site with 10 builders all working and sub-contracting to a larger company. Do they work as a team, or do they all work independently? Do they use the cement mixer that the larger company provides, or do they all bring their own?

Being an independent contractor and also being part of a team and/or using client supplied resources are not mutually exclusive and don't really have any bearing on IR35 status.

[Lockhouse]

I've had 5 contracts investigated and IMHO you are way outside. You have a genuine ROS, no D&C and the minimum of MOO. You are at your own office using your own kit most of the time. The IR might ruffle your client's feathers out of spite (and probably would), but there's no way they'd get you. If you can get the client to sign a COA letter, then all the better but I wouldn't sweat it.

Andrew

[XLMonkey]

I'm more interested in averting any possibility of an IR investigation with the end client and being caught up in a personal service -v- B2B perception problem.

I am paid a daily professional fee and had Schedule of Works drawn up, no MOO and full rights of substitution. I don't even have client control in the contract. Nevertheless, the IR still see 'actions on site' as being more important than the contract terms themselves. My client has never tried to impose any rules on me about working hours, time allowed at home or anything else that suggest personal service. It's just the 'member of a team' part I am uncomfortable about.

To be honest, what you've written above is (almost certainly) sufficient to demonstrate that you are operating in business on your own account, and hence outside the scope of IR35.

This issue is a common one, though. The nature of contracting/consulting work is that you need to be part of the client's team in order to be as effective as possible. I don't see participation in those sorts of team building events to be in any way an indicator of quasi-employee status, or of a lack of respect for your status as a supplier. I've worked for long periods with big consultancy firms, and they do this sort of thing all the time without any suggestion that it means that their consultants are actually the client's employees.

I would advise you not to worry about this, but instead to ensure that you have a robust paper trail demonstrating your status as a business. In my case, this translates to basic professional stuff like:
- bi-weekly progress reports against my terms of reference
- deliverables acceptance sheets, signed off by the client, about every 2 months
- once a quarter, asking the client to fill out a customer satisfaction form for the services that have been provided.

With a papertrail like that, it is entirely irrelevant which distribution lists etc you are on. You can just package up all the audit trail (with client signatures) and send it off to HMRC -- they will get the message.

[DimPrawn]

Denny get some IR35 insurance (from the likes of PCG) so that even if you are challenged (and lets face it, the IR, driven by the New Lie, want to put IT contractors out of business, so the chances are everyone will be challenged), you have a good tax and legal team behind you.

Careful not to let the spectre of IR35 drive you mad. Very few cases that have been backed by the PCG insurance have been lost (something like 3000 won, 3 lost) so chill.