Good points SJ and Chiz but I don’t think that most things are cut and dried about self-employed. Hosty keeps asking me for some definitive guide to self employment but I have resisted at most every turn (hes not agreed price for a start).
I have motives beyond my current state which is that I would prefer to work with more people who are self employed. I am glad to say that I do already work with quite a few but they are mainly specialists. What I don’t want, as I have been down the road a few times is to be the one who introduces somebody to self-employment. I would prefer a self employed to have done at least one assessment and then got an opinion. I think Geli’s example is a common one where it seems somebody finds that there is a job with the condition that you are self-employed and then feels that they were led into that state of being by the “enabler” (my latest word learnt from the ESI terminology). Almost as soon as they come across permanent staff/union they start comparing and the first Monday they feel a drug/alcohol sicky coming on and lose a fifth of their invoice out comes the groans. It also cuts the other way. I worked with three units as a self employed digger and I got wary of answering the how much after a while as it would normally bring out the lefties in droves. Most units also had their on going overtime battles in which self employment becomes another bone of contention In one situation I cut quite a good deal as a day rate as I tooted up holiday pension and employers NI. The enabler bit my hand off because they were paying for accommodation and they were about 100miles from base. I was in my home patch. Stupidly I blabbed to one of them and there was almost a riot. They couldn’t get their heads around added accommodation travel into their perks and subtracting tax.
Now I have a problem which is quite often I find work that could be undertaken by more people but I don’t want to become anybodies boss and the implications and administration of employing somebody else makes self assessment look like a walk in the park particularly if its going to be only for a day or a week and they are going to do basically the same work as me -dig. No site lasts for ever. To me employing somebody feels like doing their self assessment and national insurance and insurances and PPE ten times over with me potentially being a nasty criminal at every turn and with the likelihood that if I was to do all that “admin” I would want 100% or more profit just to insure against liabilities. I would be also setting up an example of a much higher risk taker which could be taken to show that the “others” were my employees-catch 22. On cash flow rate I would have to become vat registered, another accounting burden. I would also probably have to change my structure and become a limited company and go to taking a salary/dividend which is were the farces of Construction Industry Scheme, IR35 and S660A of the last ten years are about. That’s why I would be wary of going down SJ’s route of limited company. What do you do SJ for site workers?
But currently as you say hosty I do selfish things and can give advice on my selfish ways. An example is evaluations. I don’t compete for them but they come my way but in an example of a one day evaluation trench to which a unit might send two or three people out to do and there might be a structure of supervisor/project officer, So three people go to dig a trench for one day, is for me one self employed person digs over three days (depending on the significance). I might have a watching brief to do in that period so I stop that evaluation for a day or so and go and do the watching brief. I balance back filling machining my time the clients money. This does keep me small and selfish as hosty puts it. To get out of this lonely existence or to get out of the being in two places at once problem, one option I have is to exploit volunteers but the most attractive to me would be to work with other self employed people, people who I would have something in common with as an archaeologist.
But the discipline which is most beyond me is excavation and that is because the average number of features 20 a day, say five people four weeks turns into one person six months although if I can find a client who would accept that I would do it but it would probably be difficult to tout up front for such a circumstance but my fingers are itching to give it ago. Problem then is I would need to get rid of all my small jobs…
I have motives beyond my current state which is that I would prefer to work with more people who are self employed. I am glad to say that I do already work with quite a few but they are mainly specialists. What I don’t want, as I have been down the road a few times is to be the one who introduces somebody to self-employment. I would prefer a self employed to have done at least one assessment and then got an opinion. I think Geli’s example is a common one where it seems somebody finds that there is a job with the condition that you are self-employed and then feels that they were led into that state of being by the “enabler” (my latest word learnt from the ESI terminology). Almost as soon as they come across permanent staff/union they start comparing and the first Monday they feel a drug/alcohol sicky coming on and lose a fifth of their invoice out comes the groans. It also cuts the other way. I worked with three units as a self employed digger and I got wary of answering the how much after a while as it would normally bring out the lefties in droves. Most units also had their on going overtime battles in which self employment becomes another bone of contention In one situation I cut quite a good deal as a day rate as I tooted up holiday pension and employers NI. The enabler bit my hand off because they were paying for accommodation and they were about 100miles from base. I was in my home patch. Stupidly I blabbed to one of them and there was almost a riot. They couldn’t get their heads around added accommodation travel into their perks and subtracting tax.
Now I have a problem which is quite often I find work that could be undertaken by more people but I don’t want to become anybodies boss and the implications and administration of employing somebody else makes self assessment look like a walk in the park particularly if its going to be only for a day or a week and they are going to do basically the same work as me -dig. No site lasts for ever. To me employing somebody feels like doing their self assessment and national insurance and insurances and PPE ten times over with me potentially being a nasty criminal at every turn and with the likelihood that if I was to do all that “admin” I would want 100% or more profit just to insure against liabilities. I would be also setting up an example of a much higher risk taker which could be taken to show that the “others” were my employees-catch 22. On cash flow rate I would have to become vat registered, another accounting burden. I would also probably have to change my structure and become a limited company and go to taking a salary/dividend which is were the farces of Construction Industry Scheme, IR35 and S660A of the last ten years are about. That’s why I would be wary of going down SJ’s route of limited company. What do you do SJ for site workers?
But currently as you say hosty I do selfish things and can give advice on my selfish ways. An example is evaluations. I don’t compete for them but they come my way but in an example of a one day evaluation trench to which a unit might send two or three people out to do and there might be a structure of supervisor/project officer, So three people go to dig a trench for one day, is for me one self employed person digs over three days (depending on the significance). I might have a watching brief to do in that period so I stop that evaluation for a day or so and go and do the watching brief. I balance back filling machining my time the clients money. This does keep me small and selfish as hosty puts it. To get out of this lonely existence or to get out of the being in two places at once problem, one option I have is to exploit volunteers but the most attractive to me would be to work with other self employed people, people who I would have something in common with as an archaeologist.
But the discipline which is most beyond me is excavation and that is because the average number of features 20 a day, say five people four weeks turns into one person six months although if I can find a client who would accept that I would do it but it would probably be difficult to tout up front for such a circumstance but my fingers are itching to give it ago. Problem then is I would need to get rid of all my small jobs…