Finding rates at £550+

[doodab]

Considering just how much money £500/day actually is, it really shouldn't be surprising that most of us won't be finding roles paying that
You lose track when just playing the numbers game of trying to maximise your rate sometimes... I do anyway and I expect others must do.

I do tend to think in multiples of £50

[Kanye]

£700 is not difficult to find in the London IB scene. There are 50+ Java contracts at £650/day today and they will all roll over within a week.

A little negotiation or a rate increase between contracts and you can break £700 easily.

A few threads today have made me think people just don't negotiate hard enough.

Not willy waving, just contributing my experience.

[mykash]

A few threads today have made me think people just don't negotiate hard enough.

It's probably correct and maybe once you reach a certain level, there might be a limit on how much you can negotiate. In South East I think in non-IB £450 is the max - biting the bullet by giving an ultimatum that you won't sign the renewal without a rate increase might not work.

[kal]

It's probably correct and maybe once you reach a certain level, there might be a limit on how much you can negotiate. In South East I think in non-IB £450 is the max - biting the bullet by giving an ultimatum that you won't sign the renewal without a rate increase might not work.

Or £250 a day for a java dev role in the Midlands anyone?, me neither and thats why I commute to London...

[d000hg]

..and don't forget a lot of it disappears in tax.

When you think of the blood sweat and toil and maybe the additional expenses, eg living in London, your net rate might no be as great as you think.

Take a trip to the real world! £500/day - provided you can keep in work, which at that rate I'd hope you can because you must be pretty good - has to put you in the top 1%, maybe even the top .1%.

London may be expensive but for £500/day I could afford to keep my house up north and rent a place in zone 1 full-time.

[Kanye]

A more interesting question is how do you break out of your local ceiling rate.

There are a tier of independent consultants operating above that who are getting in via connections and pricing based on their value.

I know of one contractor/consultant billing £2k per day at Bank Of America in London and I know of a guy making £700 in Liverpool who then bought subbies in too.

How to break into that I'm not sure.

[Antman]

A more interesting question is how do you break out of your local ceiling rate.

There are a tier of independent consultants operating above that who are getting in via connections and pricing based on their value.

I know of one contractor/consultant billing £2k per day at Bank Of America in London and I know of a guy making £700 in Liverpool who then bought subbies in too.

How to break into that I'm not sure.

Me neither but I'm pretty sure the answer's not on jobswerve.

[vwdan]

Take a trip to the real world! £500/day - provided you can keep in work, which at that rate I'd hope you can because you must be pretty good - has to put you in the top 1%, maybe even the top .1%.

London may be expensive but for £500/day I could afford to keep my house up north and rent a place in zone 1 full-time.

I'm not pretending that my sums are perfect, but in moving to contracting I've tried to accurately predict my income (Including both personal and corporation taxes + the new expenses I'll incur) and even at a very modest well below market rate I should be matching my current (not unreasonable permie) earnings in less than 8 months.

[edison]

Take a trip to the real world! £500/day - provided you can keep in work, which at that rate I'd hope you can because you must be pretty good - has to put you in the top 1%, maybe even the top .1%.

London may be expensive but for £500/day I could afford to keep my house up north and rent a place in zone 1 full-time.

Ignoring the tax efficiency of dividends, assuming you billed 220 days a year, your gross income would be £110k. At that level you would be around the top 2% of earners in the UK. Top 1% is nearer to about £160k. Top 0.1% would be nearer to £300k I guess - about £1500/day at contract rates!

[edison]

IT Contractor Job Market, Ordered by Average Daily Rate^

Then compare that with:

IT Contractor Job Market, Ordered by Matching Job Ads^

Not sure how accurate those figures can be when the listed average UX Manager rate is more than an IT Director and a Programme Director....