Information Technology Recruitment

One ray of light from Philip Hammond’s latest budget comes in the form of a delayed implementation of the Off Payroll rules in the private sector (more commonly known as IR35) – although the fact that he confirmed that it WILL be rolled out in April 2020 was not quite as positive given the farce that it has been in the public sector. The problems have been multiple, with blanket decisions made by public bodies as to whether or not the rules apply, resulting in unfair, incorrect or illegal taxing of contractors, and unfair liability risk for the fee payer (often and usually the agency). Even when blanket decisions have not been made, the HMRC’s own CEST tool for making the decisions is questionable at any level of its ability to give a fair and correct decision. HMRC will continue to deny it but many contractors left the public sector (and HMRC’s own projects) to work in roles that did not deem them an employee under IR35, and where they remained, the clients often experienced significantly increased costs. When this legislation moves to the private sector it will strangely not apply to companies with less than 250 employees – will we see a similar move of contractors to smaller clients and an increased cost to larger ones? It does not feel like a level playing field. In 2017, the public sector and the contractor and agency community were given about 2 weeks to prepare after the final legislation was released (yes, you read that correctly, 2 weeks). At least now we have been given 17 months notice to educate our clients and contractors and implement relevant IT systems, HMRC has 17 months to get its own affairs in order and give us all a toolkit fit for purpose, and the government has 17 months to come to a fair decision as to who is liable for the decisions made by the end client. I won’t hold my breath.

Are you a Limited Company (PSC) worker, still confused about Off Payroll rules (currently in the Public Sector, probably coming to the private sector) and how this affects the way you’re paid, or the way you pay yourself, or how much you'll 'lose'? We are now over 18 months into the changes made regarding who makes the decision on whether IR35 applies in the public sector, yet there is still confusion as to how this actually hits contractors in the pocket. We are still speaking to many contractors who make all sorts of claims about how little they will actually take home compared to when they previously worked outside the IR35 legislation, sometimes as little as 40%. Now whilst I agree that in all but the simplest situation, contractors will be slightly worse off, but it is rarely by the amount that is first perceived (unless, of course, there are some funny goings on in terms of not quite paying the amount of tax owed (strange off shore loans or other illegal avoidance schemes*) Note that this is not tax advice and I do not intend here to go into specific calculations. Where example figures are used, these are purely that, just simple example figures, but accurate enough to give a fair representation of my points! The first thing many contractors do is to compare the net amount they will be paid inside IR35 with the gross amount they usually get outside. For example, a contractor who is used to earning £500 per day outside IR35, is likely now to be offered a rate of around £435 per day inside IR35 (the difference being the submissions that agency needs to make to HMRC for Employer’s NI, as well as the apprenticeship levy if it applies). From the £435 per day, employment deductions of Employee’s NI and PAYE will be made, before the ‘deemed’ payment is made to the ltd company. If one simply compares £500 per day to the new payment of £435 less deductions, then clearly there is a significant difference. But it is not that simple as there are other rules / obligations that need to be considered. For those INSIDE IR35: Your company is paid the Deemed Payment (the net payment after deductions made to the contractor’s ltd company): Once the deemed payment is made to the ltd company, you still need a way of taking that money out of your ltd company. This can be done in 2 ways: 1. Dividends: If you’re a director of your own company, you might choose to pay yourself a dividend from the company’s profits. You can pay yourself a tax-free dividend up to the total of the deemed direct payment received from contracts in the public sector, where Income Tax and NICs have been deducted at source. You don’t need to declare that dividend on your Self Assessment tax return. 2. Payroll: You can pay yourself for the work provided to public sector clients through your company’s payroll. As employment taxes have already been paid on the amount your intermediary (your ltd company) receives,you can pay yourself that amount without deducting Income Tax or NICs. And the icing on the cake: No Corporation Tax When you are calculating your company’s turnover, you should deduct the VAT exclusive amount of the invoice, which is the amount from which Income Tax and NICs were deducted at source. Your company accounts should show this deduction to make sure the amount is not taxed twice. So to put it simply, the amount paid to you by the agency is yours to take out of your PSC (your ltd company) WITHOUT ANY FURTHER DEDUCTIONS. For those OUTSIDE IR35 To get your £500 per day out of your ltd company, again you can pay yourself dividends, or a salary (or mixture of both) Dividends: The tax advantages between dividends and salary are diminishing but, nevertheless, there is still a slight advantage to dividends. As opposed to the Inside options above, your dividend will be liable to dividend tax, AND corporation tax. Payroll: You can take it as salary – but your company will be liable for Employer’s NI (aha, so there’s the difference between the £500 and £435 already gone), then there are the same NI and PAYE deductions taken that were taken for your deemed payment, meaning that if you were to pay yourself purely by means of a salary, your take home will be the same as if you received the deemed payment from the agency. As you can see, the difference is not as clear as might be first thought, and many roles inside IR35 have the rates inflated to compensate. So next time you are considering turning down a contract opportunity that is caught by the legislation, it might be time to think again! And to keep things really simple, using a compliant umbrella company means that the legislation will not apply, you will not have the headache of running a company, and your net pay will be virtually identical to a deemed payment. *Many contractors are unaware of the Employment Intermediaries Legislation which requires employment intermediaries (ie agencies) to submit a quarterly report to HMRC detailing ALL payments made to a contractor / contractor’s ltd company - they know what contractors should be declaring regarding all funds paid through an intermediary.

So first, what is the purpose of a CV? In many cases, when not required to add a cover letter or application form, your CV is a company’s or hiring manager’s first impression of you. You might be the most gifted candidate in your field but if you don’t engage the reader; include relevant info or stand out then you’ll be limiting your opportunities and losing out to potentially less skilled candidates. Where do people go wrong? There are a few things that this stems back to; sometimes it’s down to people using generic templates or looking for what should be in a CV online. There’s also the people teaching how to write CVs. Most of us are taught how to write a CV while at school, college or university by people who have likely never had to hire anyone in their lives. So on that point, here are some tips on writing a better CV. 1. Personal Statements Now I’m all for writing personal statements to introduce you and your CV but they don’t need to be more than a line or two. Hiring managers aren’t really that interested in this area of your CV, they want to know what you have done and what you have achieved. Instead of writing you can ‘work well as part of a team or on your own’ or ‘I am (adjective), (adjective) and (adjective)’ Save it, display it in your work history section. 2. Work History Don’t just write what you have done throughout your roles; put some achievements in there and try to add statistics if you can or if it’s relevant. As mentioned in the above section this is where displaying you’re able to work in a team or alone is more relevant, discuss your team and the role YOU played – it’s more impactful to discuss your personal attributes within this section giving relevant examples. 3. Education Within this section if you have qualifications relevant to the job role for example Prince2 for Project management or ISTQB for Testing, put them before that F you got in Art in 2001. Always include the grades and dates. With GCSEs - as important as they are - a simple ’10 GCSE’s A*-C, (including English Language (B), Maths (B))’ is enough information. 4. Layout Layout is hugely important; it needs to be clean and professional. Choose a font that’s easy to read and remains professional, usually I’d suggest any of the following; Ariel, Calibri, Georgia or Trebuchet MS. Try to use size 11/12 font and if your CV exceeds 2 pages... so what! As long as it’s well spaced out and easy to read with relevant and interesting information, we don’t care! Some people use layout to stand out from other candidates it’s a good opportunity to be creative and different. NEVER USE COMIC SANS. 5. Stand out This is where it’s up to you; be different, be creative but always be you.