London Contracts and Travel

[TykeMerc]

I've contracted for about 20 years now and spent at least 2/3rds of that away from home, unless you're living close to multiple clients odds are travel will always be a factor. It's a fact of contracting life that clients are all over the place (unless you're a city financials type where almost everything is in one place) so being willing to travel to work is a necessary reality.

While there are clients that are happy for contractors to work from home, they're pretty rare.

[Pogle]

Currently contracting in London, travel down on a Mon arrive around lunchtime, leave at lunchtime on Friday. Have a flat share with my landlady who is never in. Can work from home if I need to be up North for any reason.
Train is now free thanks to the Virgin First class loyalty reward thingy. so It costs me aroung £60 - 70 a day, and this comes in way below my budget.

I can never find anything in Manchester. I am enjoying my current project and the work is interesting and well paid.
Family are used to it and it seems to work ok for us.

[rsingh]

Train is now free thanks to the Virgin First class loyalty reward thingy. so It costs me aroung £60 - 70 a day, and this comes in way below my budget.

I can never find anything in Manchester. I am enjoying my current project and the work is interesting and well paid.
Family are used to it and it seems to work ok for us.

How does the Virgin first class loyalty scheme work? I used to be a member of the Traveller club, but the Manchester to Euston tickets were rarely if ever available early on a Monday. Is it the same scheme?

[psychocandy]

I've been doing this for years now. £ 100 a day is about the difference. However, it's getting harder and harder to secure contract work in the London/Banking sector because they're downsizing and offshoring massively. Expect stiff competition. If I could get the same rate minus my £ 100 back north where I live I'd be back in the drop of a hat as it's by far a better quality of life. Trouble is I can't. In 10 years contracting I've only had 3 years near home. The trick is to get that golden 1 day a week working from home. It means if you commute down in a morning, you are only away from home 3 nights a week. Psychologically, makes a big difference.

With my contracting career, off an on over the years, 6-7 years of which have been contracting, I've been lucky.

Probably 90% has been close to home (within an hour). One or two just over so borderline but never had to do the mon-fri thing yet.

Agree about the 4 days per week. Huge difference and something I considered. Even 4 long commutes is massively better than 5 days.

Even had a gig lined up in London (2 hours by train plus tube for me) for mon-tues on site, wfh wed, site thurs (long day there and back planned), wfh friday. Would have been just one night away and one long day but excellent.

Pity it got pulled at last minute because rate was +50% normal as well :-(

[flipFlop]

As we all know majority of contracts are in London area and the rates are great

Your premise is abject nonsense.

As someone who lives in Central London knows, the majority of contracts are in Haiti, Northampton, Cambridge, Tewkesbury, Newbury, Switzerland, Austria, Germany, The Netherlands... anywhere but in London.

[Pogle]

How does the Virgin first class loyalty scheme work? I used to be a member of the Traveller club, but the Manchester to Euston tickets were rarely if ever available early on a Monday. Is it the same scheme?

Yep its the Traveller club. I used it last time i worked in London too.
Never ever had a problem getting the tickets i want.

[texto]

Your premise is abject nonsense.

As someone who lives in Central London knows, the majority of contracts are in Haiti, Northampton, Cambridge, Tewkesbury, Newbury, Switzerland, Austria, Germany, The Netherlands... anywhere but in London.

I was referring to IT contracts within the UK

So you're saying - Northampton, Cambridge, Newbury. I would still need to add 100-150/day as people have posted - to account for expenses if I'm living in the north like Leeds, Manchester etc.

[The Spartan]

It depends what field you work in to be fair, but I agree with you as the bulk of contracts are actually in and around the London.

[stek]

Agent: Contract is £450 p/d in London

Contractor: Oh, London, in that case I want £600 p/d cos it's dear there.

Agent: Ok, no problem, I'll amend the contract from £450 p/d to £600 p/d and pop it it into the post, thanks!

Contractor: Cheers mate!

Is that what happens then?

[d000hg]

Agent: Contract is £450 p/d in London

Contractor: Oh, London, in that case I want £600 p/d cos it's dear there.

Agent: Ok, no problem, I'll amend the contract from £450 p/d to £600 p/d and pop it it into the post, thanks!

Contractor: Cheers mate!

Is that what happens then?

Did you forget to login as your sockie?