Reply to: The PS, IR35 and GCloud

[Gomez]

Grateful for some perspective on this. I appreciate it.

Nicely worked and does look pretty safe but you haven't mentioned what is being delivered by his consultancy. It might be on GCloud but if it is still delivering personal services directly to the client sitting along side permies etc I can't help but thinking you are going to be caught. The order for 6 months work is the red flag for me. If you had said phase 2 or a new service I would have been OK. The devil is deep in the details of the engagement regardless of your situation LTD to LTD.

What is being delivered are a number of discrete pieces of work across a range of projects. Some of this is follow on work on projects that have been supported over the last 6 months or so. G-Cloud has to be 'bought' on number of days or hours generally. I guess one thing in my favour is that there are no other contractors on site (or permies for that matter) doing what I am doing. I don't think they could refer to my work as BoS.

Sounds like you are in a good place but there are enough red flags in that post to make me think you want to be right on top of this and not assuming your are fine IMO.

I'm not making any assumption I will be fine. What the client say now and what they say come April could be completely different. I'm going to keep a really close eye on things.

[easy rider]

This guy knows how to play the PS

Denial over Scottish government IT project 'conflict' - BBC News

[northernladuk]

I'm in an interesting position which is totally related to this thread. Currently coming into client via G-Cloud through a micro consultancy that is owned by a friend of mine. Contract between my LTD and friend's LTD has been reviewed by Abbey Tax as being outside IR35. I have clear deliverables and timeframes in the contract. My friend has contacted the client who currently state that they are not considering anything off G-Cloud to be an issue in relation to IR35. I'm hoping that will continue to be the case post April as client wants to place an order for another 6 months work.

Nicely worked and does look pretty safe but you haven't mentioned what is being delivered by his consultancy. It might be on GCloud but if it is still delivering personal services directly to the client sitting along side permies etc I can't help but thinking you are going to be caught. The order for 6 months work is the red flag for me. If you had said phase 2 or a new service I would have been OK. The devil is deep in the details of the engagement regardless of your situation LTD to LTD.

My view on this is that it will be worth taking the risk. If client decides that G-Cloud is fair game when it comes to determining status, I will make sure I have done everything to prove that I am outside. Contract review and certificate, use own equipment, work remotely from own office, right of substitution, insurances, etc etc etc. An earlier poster made the key point that IR35 itself hasn't changed.

I've also just applied to get onto DOS framework.

I don't think Gcloud itself will come under scrutiny but the individual contracts could. They've already cleaned out the agencies including the 'consultancy' I was with that was just delivering bodies. If there is a mad rush to Gcloud and people fudging the process I can't help but think it will come under scrutiny. Again looking after yourself won't help if the legislation applies. Contract reviews aren't considered etc. It will be down to the percentage of personal service you offer.

Sounds like you are in a good place but there are enough red flags in that post to make me think you want to be right on top of this and not assuming your are fine IMO.

[Gomez]

I'm in an interesting position which is totally related to this thread. Currently coming into client via G-Cloud through a micro consultancy that is owned by a friend of mine. Contract between my LTD and friend's LTD has been reviewed by Abbey Tax as being outside IR35. I have clear deliverables and timeframes in the contract. My friend has contacted the client who currently state that they are not considering anything off G-Cloud to be an issue in relation to IR35. I'm hoping that will continue to be the case post April as client wants to place an order for another 6 months work.

My view on this is that it will be worth taking the risk. If client decides that G-Cloud is fair game when it comes to determining status, I will make sure I have done everything to prove that I am outside. Contract review and certificate, use own equipment, work remotely from own office, right of substitution, insurances, etc etc etc. An earlier poster made the key point that IR35 itself hasn't changed.

I've also just applied to get onto DOS framework.

[youngguy]

Well that's what I'm getting at.

I'm not looking to 'get around' anything, but looking at it from another perspective which is given most of us ex/current PS contractors know how things work there, then what is to stop a few like minded contractors clubbing together, forming a consultancy, potentially taking on some salaried staff and going to market via one of these frameworks.

If there is some tangible walk out, and the Government attempts to procure outcomes/specialists in the way they 'say' they want to do it (yes, big 'IF') then maybe this is an opportunity.

The other alternatives/workarounds discussed on other threads are completely outside of what I'm suggesting, which on the face of it (not that anyone is giving any details) appear to just be artificial structures attempting to keep PSC contractors doing what they have always done.

I looked into this once.

It needs money upfront, much more effort and actually being a full business with staff and when it came to it, the bunch of people talking to me seemed to think it wasn't gonna be a long hard slog.

It is doable , but I personally decided the risk was too great. Each to their own of course

[eek]

Yeah, actually running a consultancy is the difficult part. I'm not about to go doing that quite yet. Besides, a bunch of lone wolf contractors does not a consultancy make (probably). Was interesting to sound out just what opportunities these frameworks supposedly offer.

That's easy. You go and look at the historic tenders on the government website and work out what is needed to deliver one and how you would get a start up consultancy ahead of the bigger players - hint in my case it would be existing tools that I own that do at least half the work they require given me a prototype to demo

[nucastle]

There is nothing to stop you doing that. A question I'd ask is why you haven't done that before if you think that it's a good business opportunity to enable you to expand and build that consultancy (or is there a lack of opportunities being advertised that you think will pick up in the near future?).

The danger you face is that you have little to no experience of running a consultancy, which is different from running a one-person business, a lack of track record when the client says "where have you done this before", and the potential to have some one (or more than one) not deliver as much as they promised and you have to pick up the slack. If you can get past that, then it's a great idea and you should do it; if you can't then it's an awful idea.

Some years ago, three friends of mine and I looked at building more of a consultancy together, but it never took hold because some of us were more interested in the idea than others. It now looks like one of us is (to quote an agent) "off his game these days" and is struggling with the contracts that he does get - if we'd gone ahead then by this stage we would have ended up carrying him for a while.

Good luck with the business - I hope it does pay off for you, if you pursue that direction.

Yeah, actually running a consultancy is the difficult part. I'm not about to go doing that quite yet. Besides, a bunch of lone wolf contractors does not a consultancy make (probably). Was interesting to sound out just what opportunities these frameworks supposedly offer.

[northernladuk]

Nah mate, I'm done with the PS.

[TheFaQQer]

I'm not looking to 'get around' anything, but looking at it from another perspective which is given most of us ex/current PS contractors know how things work there, then what is to stop a few like minded contractors clubbing together, forming a consultancy, potentially taking on some salaried staff and going to market via one of these frameworks.

There is nothing to stop you doing that. A question I'd ask is why you haven't done that before if you think that it's a good business opportunity to enable you to expand and build that consultancy (or is there a lack of opportunities being advertised that you think will pick up in the near future?).

The danger you face is that you have little to no experience of running a consultancy, which is different from running a one-person business, a lack of track record when the client says "where have you done this before", and the potential to have some one (or more than one) not deliver as much as they promised and you have to pick up the slack. If you can get past that, then it's a great idea and you should do it; if you can't then it's an awful idea.

Some years ago, three friends of mine and I looked at building more of a consultancy together, but it never took hold because some of us were more interested in the idea than others. It now looks like one of us is (to quote an agent) "off his game these days" and is struggling with the contracts that he does get - if we'd gone ahead then by this stage we would have ended up carrying him for a while.

Good luck with the business - I hope it does pay off for you, if you pursue that direction.

[northernladuk]

I'm not certain about your last line - some of my best rates have been in public sector, so I can see why there would be a certain appeal. However, that's irrelevant from April unless the rates are truly amazing.

And so was my rate and yes I can see the attraction but it's just another piece of the contractor pie. They weren't that good that I'd be making up all sorts of dubious schemes as an attempt to stay because it's all I know and scared of leaving the PS. You just have to shrug and carry on being a contractor. If you are that desperate to stay then you ain't a contractor.

[nucastle]

I'm not to sure why you are still going on about this. If you want to do it go ahead. No point trying to convince us. Enough of us know that a bunch of contractors makes an awful platform for a service, the cost of setting this up, the risks of having all your eggs in one basket, then politics of the PS and so on to be highly skeptical so you aren't going to convince us. Time to do and not talk and prove us wrong. Take a look on GCloud, see what you can actually delivery and get started.

A smart cookie that can pull this off will already be working at it and don't need these changes to makemit happen. The fact you are doing this in response to the changes is to me a 'get around'. If it's possible why didn't you don't before. Now you are up against every other Tom Dick and Harry and trying to get the ear of the right people that aren't sick of hearing this so it is going to just get harder.

You are right. If you can do it it's a good idea. Time to just get on with it.

Nah mate, I'm done with the PS.

[eek]

Is the same not true of all the local consultancies who have embedded teams at HMRC/DWP? Newcastle has the likes of Orangebus, Indigo Blue and Opencast Software all doing the same thing.

Yep, they are just better at recruiting staff than HMRC for reasons I've never quite grasped. Mind you I've never dealt with an Orangebus, Indigo Blue or Opencast employee that I would actually employ, they are just Northern version of Indian bodyshops providing poor skillsets at prices slightly above said Indian bodyshops.

[northernladuk]

Is the same not true of all the local consultancies who have embedded teams at HMRC/DWP? Newcastle has the likes of Orangebus, Indigo Blue and Opencast Software all doing the same thing.

Difference is they got on with it at the right time rather than talked about it. Those are the ones that won the business BTW. Look at the number of suppliers in GCloud that didn't.

[northernladuk]

Well that's what I'm getting at.

I'm not looking to 'get around' anything, but looking at it from another perspective which is given most of us ex/current PS contractors know how things work there, then what is to stop a few like minded contractors clubbing together, forming a consultancy, potentially taking on some salaried staff and going to market via one of these frameworks.

If there is some tangible walk out, and the Government attempts to procure outcomes/specialists in the way they 'say' they want to do it (yes, big 'IF') then maybe this is an opportunity.

The other alternatives/workarounds discussed on other threads are completely outside of what I'm suggesting, which on the face of it (not that anyone is giving any details) appear to just be artificial structures attempting to keep PSC contractors doing what they have always done.

I'm not to sure why you are still going on about this. If you want to do it go ahead. No point trying to convince us. Enough of us know that a bunch of contractors makes an awful platform for a service, the cost of setting this up, the risks of having all your eggs in one basket, then politics of the PS and so on to be highly skeptical so you aren't going to convince us. Time to do and not talk and prove us wrong. Take a look on GCloud, see what you can actually delivery and get started.

A smart cookie that can pull this off will already be working at it and don't need these changes to makemit happen. The fact you are doing this in response to the changes is to me a 'get around'. If it's possible why didn't you don't before. Now you are up against every other Tom Dick and Harry and trying to get the ear of the right people that aren't sick of hearing this so it is going to just get harder.

You are right. If you can do it it's a good idea. Time to just get on with it.

[nucastle]

Good luck with that plan. My comment would be watch out for freeloaders as you do all the work.....

Is the same not true of all the local consultancies who have embedded teams at HMRC/DWP? Newcastle has the likes of Orangebus, Indigo Blue and Opencast Software all doing the same thing.