28th August 2009, 07:23 PM
thanks for your breakdown David, although you still haven't identified that we are not comparing like for like between the day rate and the employee wage. I'm sure though that how you break it down is how the company in question worked out their rates.
If you work as a freelancer you should treat costs as just that, otherwise I imagine the taxman would be rather interested. What you describe is someone working for a company and covering all their own costs but not putting these down as costs. I imagine the taxman would be rather interested in that too, especially if only working for one employer. So travel, accomodation, memberships, bank charges, accountant/legal advice, buying equipment (you do need some tools, some units demand all tools, and some units say all your own permatrace etc too!, even when doing labour-only), time lost to do accounts and fill tax returns, unpaid time dealing with contracts and trying to get work, phone bills, web hosting. It all adds up. It is not like for like. That is why the IFA paper estimated a day rate at about ?200 a day to get an income of c?20,000 a year.
If you work as a freelancer you should treat costs as just that, otherwise I imagine the taxman would be rather interested. What you describe is someone working for a company and covering all their own costs but not putting these down as costs. I imagine the taxman would be rather interested in that too, especially if only working for one employer. So travel, accomodation, memberships, bank charges, accountant/legal advice, buying equipment (you do need some tools, some units demand all tools, and some units say all your own permatrace etc too!, even when doing labour-only), time lost to do accounts and fill tax returns, unpaid time dealing with contracts and trying to get work, phone bills, web hosting. It all adds up. It is not like for like. That is why the IFA paper estimated a day rate at about ?200 a day to get an income of c?20,000 a year.