Reply to: My story, and how it's relavent to recent IR35 determinations and corporate scapegoat

[eek]

SimonMac has one and no one wants to hear about it but apparently he showed everyone anyway.

Be glad you never worked with him

[northernladuk]

Opinions are like bottoms. We all have one - no-one wants to hear about anyone elses.

Sadly you have entirely missed the point. Still, never mind....

SimonMac has one and no one wants to hear about it but apparently he showed everyone anyway.

[WordIsBond]

Opinions are like bottoms. We all have one - no-one wants to hear about anyone elses.

Are you telling me that all these women who have been saying for so many years how much they like mine were lying?

[northernladuk]

but they do have some level of influence!

OK so there is a difference between you and them then.

[WTFH]

This is exactly the type of misguided thinking that benefits only those who stand to gain from our collective suffering. We suffer for different reasons but we still suffer. Let' stop and look at the elephant in the room, who is not suffering. Maybe then it will become clear just how "convenient" all the suffering is to the elephant.

I was replying to a very specific person who has 1 client, has worked there for well over a decade, has no substitute and claims to understand the law and financial processes of contracting - and is happy to derail every thread to talk about himself.

That is different to NHS workers being forced but he current corrupt government to become "contractors".

But it is not different to people who choose to become contractors and are only interested in working for one company in one location for several years doing one job that could equally be done by a permanent employee.

[BrilloPad]

The problem, as I see it, is that........

Opinions are like bottoms. We all have one - no-one wants to hear about anyone elses.

Sadly you have entirely missed the point. Still, never mind....

[Cirrus]

our contribution to our collective suffering is mostly due to ignorance and NOT malevolence.

Our collective suffering is HMRC coming after contractors to conform to IR35, and winning. For nearly twenty years everyone has known the Revenue wanted to treat contractors as PAYE. After two decades of failure they pick a clever strategy that has moved things from negligible to very significant in terms of compliance. Your social anthropological analysis, with notions of exploitation, freedom etc, is completely disconnected with the simple reality. Incidentally no contractor I've ever met has expressed such sentiments.

[phillyleads]

You don't agree, but that doesn't mean that after however many decades working for one company, with no possible substitute and no desire to look elsewhere for work, that you represent what contracting is about.

You are exactly the sort of person that HMRC are going after - and the reason why the rest of us are suffering.

This is exactly the type of misguided thinking that benefits only those who stand to gain from our collective suffering. We suffer for different reasons but we still suffer. Let' stop and look at the elephant in the room, who is not suffering. Maybe then it will become clear just how "convenient" all the suffering is to the elephant.

I see three kinds of people here:

1. Those who truly, in mind and in practice, operate as independent contractors. As so beautifully described by @cojak in https://www.contractoruk.com/forums/ir35-reform/129193-forced-into-contracting-read.html
   
2. Those who heard the buzz word "contracting" and either entered into it willingly or forcefully without knowing what they were getting into and therefor susceptible to being exploited by their soon to be masters.
3. Those who understand enough about contracting but with a false sense of believe as to just how far the "tax benefits" extend when operating under a limited company. The ultimate goal here is to reduce the tax liability and maximise net take-home. They have no sense of what true freedom is and the responsibilities that comes with it. They have no objections to being slaves to their masters and even though some are oblivious to the fact most use the excuse of proclaimed "financial benefit" to justify their true inner suffering.

The problem, as I see it, is that on a community/worker class level is that group 2 and 3 are characterised as being one in the same by group 1, resulting in material and psychological grievances between [group 1] and [group 2+3].

I'm sorry, but this has been described by the courts in many employment status disputes. The 2nd and 3rd group have been described by various high/supreme courts as being an "intermediate class of worker" or "limb b" and who are subordinate and usually carries out the work personally. Subordination does NOT and can NOT exist in group 1, yet somehow, on top of the already misguided grievances between the groups, they are now all grouped under one umbrella as "Self-employed", aka independent contractor!! No wonder it takes a supreme court judge to untangle this mess! Yet somehow we think we have all the answers by pointing fingers at one another?

How can three groups of people said to represent a single group when their ideology is fundamentally different. This is not a black and white problem and cannot be solved with force or economic penalties. In my opinion it would require exposing the elephant, educating the ignorant and punishing those who choose to continue after being so educated.

I hope you can see just how counter-productive these kind of remarks are. I'm not suggesting that we are somehow faultless in our ocean of despair, but our contribution to our collective suffering is mostly due to ignorance and NOT malevolence. The same cannot be said of those pulling the strings.

[phillyleads]

If you were forced to incorporate, and earned no more than a perm employee, why did you stay there? We’re there no other roles available at other companies?

Sorry for your situation but I can’t get my head around how you could end up in a situation where you have to start consider tribunals etc. Why not leave for a better situation on another companies payroll?

The shackles of immigration. Trust me, you will never know until you experience it.

[phillyleads]

Yep, that’s how I read it too PAC.

The OP should have read this first... Forced into contracting? Read this first.

(Although I appreciate that he doesn’t sound like a minimum wage kind of guy.)

Thank you!! You were right on the money in suggesting this read

I can clearly see how my "mentality" (you refer to it as these people) use to be of the type as described in your post (Forced into contracting? Read this first.). You did a great job in writing that post and clearly highlighted the true distinct nature between real independent contractors and gig-economy workers forced to work through limited companies.

I hope I can one day put to use the knowledge that I have acquired and have the freedom that I now seek.

It's true what they say: "You don't know what you have until you lose it". For me, that meant proving the existence of my master's chains around my ankles only to realise that I never want to be chained again!

[phillyleads]

So what you are saying is that if found inside, you can take them to the county court and receive over 100,000 (I'm guessing pounds) which you will then pay to HMRC after the investigation for having been found inside? So as well as collecting VAT for HMRC, you are suggesting contractors collect 'lost' employers NI too - in a roundabout way?

Hopefully my updated post shows that this is not what I meant PS: The courts have already ruled on this matter: HMRC should not pursue claimants who acquire (and rightfully so) employment rights. This not only requires separate litigation in the required tax but the court of appeal has warning HMRC that this would be against "public policy". This has a particular meaning in law, it's worth looking it up (it certainly surprised me)

In all seriousness though - I understand what you were saying. It seems you were forced to incorporate and this is exactly what the IR35 regulations are about - to prevent employers taking advantage of their staff by avoiding NICs.

Yip, it sucks. And this happened to me 1 month after arriving in the UK. I didn't know what NI was, I had no bloody clue as to what I was doing and hence why I didn't want to do it.

Most professional contractors are not in this position. They go into contracting with their eyes open, wanting to provide professional services to clients, very much under a contract for services basis. They are happy to forego the 'employment' perks for running their own lives.

I guess I was unlucky. My client (now classified as former employer) had over 40 contractors. They all shared the same mentality which was "earn a bit more money" but technically you are "employed". Perhaps this corporation favored a particular "type" of contractor, however best to avoid going down that road as not be sound conspiratorial.

Anyway, this mentality obviously added to my prior experiences as a contractor (New Zealand, 5 years). Unfortunately, I've never had the opportunity to meet and work alongside true independent contractors. Maybe one day, now that I have a better understand of what it takes to really be free when contracting and that standing your ground and being independent is crucial.

[phillyleads]

Try this: -



So client says you are an employee. You say you are not an employee. So you sue for employee rights.....

Now try this bit: -


I sort of agree. But the master here is HMRC. The fight against here is against HMRC. That was lost when retrospection came in.

I updated the original post and added examples to clarify the meaning behind the scenarios presented. Your reply (although sarcastic) was helpful in highlighting this and how easily it is to construed otherwise when not written clearly with appropriate examples.

[phillyleads]

Tried to read twice. Gave up both times. Anyone care to summarise?

I am sorry. My post was littered with spelling mistakes and grammatical errors (and probably still are). I tried my best to fix them and added some additional context with examples to clarify what I meant. English is not my first language.

[phillyleads]

Hmmm.... Have you been talking to JtB?

No, I don't know who that is.

And if your "client" has decided not to use PSC contractors for their own reasons and so hasn't made a determination of any kind...?

This is not the question I was trying to give feedback on. My feedback relates to signing a client's determination letter.

And your basic premise is wrong. Most contractors in my fairly wide experience don't want to be employees of any kind. It's not about rights - I get all the ones I need from my own company, thanks - but the freedom from being someone's servant.

Perhaps you just missed my point? Contractors want freedom, that's the whole point of being one. The reality is that very few contractors have the kind of freedom that most are made to believe exists when you are an independent contractor in today's gig-economy. Many research papers have been written as to this fact. If you haven't read them, I highly recommend you do. (some are 300 pages )

And finally, we have been saying very loudly hat your new permanent/umbrella/agency temp/whatever contract needs to be as far away as possible from your previous freelance one. Anyone who simply changes status without a completely new contract is a fool.

This is useful advice for @geefrew. I hope he gets to read it.

[WordIsBond]

Well that's going well. Best estimates put it that overall tax income will go down by about £2.5bn a year as a result of these changes....

With HMRC (or government in general) never conflate intent with result. 'Tis almost a requirement of the laws of nature that these things will differ when government acts, and especially when tax authorities act.