PCG News on gov contracts - Will the government ever **** off and leave me alone?

[The Spartan]

They don't escape by taking cash. They escape because they are proper service providers / businesses.

I'm an external service provider how am I not a proper service provider?

[IR35FanClub]

I know a 50yo brickie / window cleaner who bought a 250k house cash and has around 20K cash sitting in his house and pays little tax if at all. Unfair. Very unfair. I also know someone who earns close to 3million a year who pays near enough 10% tax. Unfair. Very unfair. And this is true! Just be thankfull you're paying about 25% and get on with it...

It's what makes me laught about how they pick on us as we are easy targets. Can you see the gov giving a guide to all homeowners that says "Anyone employing a contract tradesman such as a plumber or electrician has to make sure they are paying the correct level of income tax and national insurance". Like that would go down well.

I' m happy paying 25% it's when it hits over 50% with employers and employees NI, I start to check the weather overseas. The business I'm setting up a the mo can be run from anywhere in the world with an internet connection. If it's successfull I'll stop posting on here and start posting on www.expat-taxavoiding-scumbags.com LOL.

[IR35FanClub]

If however you’ve been in the same IB for 5 years doing the same job. And yes I do mean same job, well ...

Exactly - that's what even I would calledd a disguised employee! You aren't providing a short term service. You are part and parcel. In fact I've worked a few places with long term contractors - when I was permy myself. I volunteered as an employee rep when they announced complusory redundancies as they were laying off permies whilst keeping 5-10 year stint contractors who were "essential to the business". If that isn't disguised employment I don't know what is!

Another example of the "discrimination" against contractors is the refit that's going on in our offices. Some guys are her laying ethernet cables and have been for several months as there a 6 floors to do. I bet they aren't inside IR35. They are using their own tools though, so I guess that is ok! If it was practical I'd bring in my own desk and chair and stick my own PC on it. Heck - I might even argue that unless I specifically need to work on my clients PC I'll do it all on my own. But that would still mean government policy is making me do stupid things just to avoid paying unecessary taxes. So they still win.

[Ignis Fatuus]

Avoiding reviews and office politics doesn't stop you being an employee...

I dunno I think most of us contractors are clearly not employees, but are equally not independent businesses either. We have elements of both and lack elements of both.

I am afraid that I agree with you. I am not an employee, but I am not a real business either. I am a worker, in the sense that all the money I make comes from my own labour: not from investment, rent, or profit. Therefore if there are taxes on earned income, logically I am liable to pay them. I might wish that there were not so many taxes, or so much tax, on income, but that's not the same as trying to claim that I am not liable for these taxes.

I do suspect that many people who argue that IR35 is illogical are not motivated by horror of illogic, but by a simple wish to pay less tax. Well, we can all wish that.

[speling bee]

Are you sure it's facist? Not bourgeois or any of the other melodramatic words people use without knowing what they mean?

It is absolutely facist. The faceless bureaucrats are discriminating against the rest of us.

[Ignis Fatuus]

What they should do is just harmonise the dividend and income tax rate, and then there wouldn't be a problem.

Spot-on! Tax income. Full stop.

They do that in France, for example. No separate NIC-style taxes. There are "social contributions" but you pay those on all income regardless of source or type. Therefore the Franch taxman feels no need to get into arguments with you about your employment status: he doesn't care, you're paying the same tax anyway.

[escapeUK]

I know a 50yo brickie / window cleaner who bought a 250k house cash and has around 20K cash sitting in his house and pays little tax if at all. Unfair. Very unfair. I also know someone who earns close to 3million a year who pays near enough 10% tax. Unfair. Very unfair. And this is true! Just be thankfull you're paying about 25% and get on with it...

Yes paying £300k a year in tax does sound unfair, I dont agree that one person should pay £5k and another £300k or more. There should be a top maximum it cannot go above.

[Jeebo72]

Yes paying £300k a year in tax does sound unfair, I dont agree that one person should pay £5k and another £300k or more. There should be a top maximum it cannot go above.

I also agree. But then I'm one of the very few who agreed with the poll tax being introduced...ah Maggie's Brittain. Sadly missed.

[d000hg]

I'm an external service provider how am I not a proper service provider?

Because they hired you as a member of a team, a temporary employee to fill a gap.

[speling bee]

Because they hired you as a member of a team, a temporary employee to fill a gap.

So a management consultant is an employee of the client?