I am not cut out to be a contractor!

[unixman]

£300/day still gets you net take home of over £4k which is a lot better than perm salary of £50k. However you lose a lot of the benefits.....

The difference is probably about 5k, and for that you are trading in all advantages/security of perm work, holidays and training. Heck even the hols would cancel out 5k for a 50k permie. I am not going perm any time soon though.

[NorthWestPerm2Contr]

true, but the child benefit clawback between £50k->£60k makes going permie not a very pleasant option....

that is correct. + the idea of paying the higher band tax rate makes me wanna

I would avoid going perm just for the sake of that.

[MyUserName]

The difference is probably about 5k, and for that you are trading in all advantages/security of perm work, holidays and training. Heck even the hols would cancel out 5k for a 50k permie. I am not going perm any time soon though.

Whilst all of that is true what is really swinging it for me is the job security of this place. 50k a year is going to be that each year (subject to redundancy etc.) whereas the £300 a day is only that for as long as you are at that gig.

[unixman]

What a horrible life, having to slum it on only £55k

It's not the income that is the issue, but the difference between contract/perm. The rewards of contracting over permanent are low at the moment,. I hope temporarily.

[original PM]

Whilst all of that is true what is really swinging it for me is the job security of this place. 50k a year is going to be that each year (subject to redundancy etc.) whereas the £300 a day is only that for as long as you are at that gig.

Indeed and if you get a good few years under your belt before redundancy then that payment can sometimes be quite a relevant sum...

so if you say get on £50k per year for 10 years you will earn 500k (before deductions etc) and if you add in a bit of bonus etc it can sometimes be difficult for a contractor to match that consistently unless they are very niche/in demand and keep their skills up to date.

[MyUserName]

Hmmm ... 3 month renewal came through today but only has 1 month on it. Not exactly the sign I was hoping for.

No one has come back with an answer for the perm thing though, manager just says the directors have to decide.

[NorthWestPerm2Contr]

Hmmm ... 3 month renewal came through today but only has 1 month on it. Not exactly the sign I was hoping for.

No one has come back with an answer for the perm thing though, manager just says the directors have to decide.

What area do you work in again? If it is testing then Perm would be a good move IMO. If you were in development then I'd say the future is bright for contractors and stick with it.

[The Spartan]

What makes you say that? Testing also has a bright future there's plenty about at the moment

[eek]

What makes you say that? Testing also has a bright future there's plenty about at the moment

I think he's a dev so sees things in his own viewpoint.

Can't really see a problem with either the dev or testing contract market at the moment. There does seem to be work around....

[NorthWestPerm2Contr]

What makes you say that? Testing also has a bright future there's plenty about at the moment

Perhaps I am wrong, I have just seen very few testing contracts around when I do my usual searches on jobserve.....

Also they seem to be shifting all the testing work onto devs more and more often these days. Currently doing testing, validation, development and release work. While I can appreciate that specialised testers are best at doing testing work, a lot of companies just don't budget for them or do the release cycle thing correctly.