Role Inside IR35 and Outside IR35 with Different Agencies

[Zylon]

I was contacted by an agent for a public sector role listed as IR35 recently. I clarified that the role was inside, and that they would require me to run it through an umbrella company which is not ideal, but they agreed to a decent rate even accounting for that so I went ahead and applied.

I was then contacted by a different agency for what I am certain is the same role, but which stated and I clarified was outside IR35.

The non-IR35 rate was similar (so better off net) and after some deliberation I applied for it through them too. I've read the advice that this can result in difficult situations with agents fighting. The reason wasn't so much the money, rather that the first agent was borderline inept - I'm not an agent-basher and wouldn't say that about many people, but he could barely string a sentence together and I really struggled to communicate with him.

So ultimately I decided it was better to risk an agent bunfight and lose a contract I might get, than to rely on the first agent to represent me, especially for a lower net rate.

I'm after advice now - should I withdraw my application from the first agent? (from discussions I believe he won't have submitted CVs to the client yet). Or should I just keep quiet and play dumb if they receive it twice - easy to claim I thought it was a different role being both inside and outside IR35!

Also if anybody thinks I've made a bad move here and should have just stuck with the first agent, do be honest.

[SueEllen]

If your CV is with the client you can't withdraw anything.

[Zylon]

If your CV is with the client you can't withdraw anything.

Fair enough, perhaps I'm being naive to assume the agent wouldn't have sent it until the deadline date. I'll just keep quiet I think.

When I've recruited I didn't care in the slightest if I received the same CV from multiple agencies, but I never thought about it from the other side.

[Hobosapien]

Unless both agencies clearly say who the client is then if the client has placed the vacancy with multiple agencies they should expect some duplication of CVs through that match the role/skillset.

How they handle that as far as which to discard, if not both, is for them to know and you to find out, hopefully.

[SueEllen]

Fair enough, perhaps I'm being naive to assume the agent wouldn't have sent it until the deadline date. I'll just keep quiet I think.

When I've recruited I didn't care in the slightest if I received the same CV from multiple agencies, but I never thought about it from the other side.

Thing is if the role is inside, you clearly aren't tulip and have the right nationality/visa why will they wait?

Oh and the other agent maybe lying as they may not know whether the role is inside or not. I was looking at some of the framework roles and some of them haven't determined the status. If an agent was illegally getting contractors via that framework they would say the role is outside to draw them in.

[SlipTheJab]

The most inept response I've had from an agent when I asked her if the role was outside IR35 was a reply of 'no, its actually inside the M25'

[SlipTheJab]

The most inept response I've had from an agent when I asked her if the role was outside IR35 was a reply of 'no, its actually inside the M25'

She came back later that day to confirm this was a 'special' role that was not caught by the new PS changes (standard dev role for the NHS working with crap tech on an ad-hoc 'do as i say' project, bum on seat, caught even more then PC, 'Mark as spam' is a very useful Google function

[Elliegirl]

Fair enough, perhaps I'm being naive to assume the agent wouldn't have sent it until the deadline date. I'll just keep quiet I think.

When I've recruited I didn't care in the slightest if I received the same CV from multiple agencies, but I never thought about it from the other side.

Yep. Play dumb approach worked fine for me in a possibly similar situation. Agent 1 said he had submitted me and hadn't. Agent 2 did submit and I got a rather nice long contract out of it.