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Back in 2020, I was able to make £800 per day doing outside IR35 work. Similar level of experience but in TypeScript, React and Node. Working for an investment

by lhnz 4y ago

Back in 2020, I was able to make £800 per day doing outside IR35 work. Similar level of experience but in TypeScript, React and Node. Working for an investment bank at the time; however you can get similar rates when working as a Tech Lead. At this rate, I was slightly outside of the normal range at lots of places. It helps if there is a Managing Director that knows you're decent as they can help to sign-off on higher rates. Unfortunately I found this almost impossible to regularly achieve because it takes time to build your network and show your worth. Having to constantly start again with zero reputation at every workplace I go to was one of the reasons I decided to stop contracting. The other reason was the downturn in the contractor market caused by the possibility of IR35 enforcement and the reaction to this by big risk-adverse companies.

Silhouette 4y ago
I'm impressed that you managed to get an outside IR35 role with an investment bank in 2020. The rate looks decent or even a little above average for the industry as you say. However IME 100% of big financial firms went umbrella to avoid the IR35 risks that were about to arrive (even if those risks then got deferred by a year) so in reality what they were offering was more equivalent to something in the low £600s outside IR35. Getting £800 for an outside gig would have been a good win at that time.
- lhnz 4y ago
  I was still on an outside IR35 contract up until October 2020, and then on another at a financial firm on a slightly lower rate until April 2021. You are right though, that it was getting more and more difficult around then. At the first firm they stopped granting outside IR35 contracts during 2020, but were able to grant extensions if one was requested by somebody in leadership however eventually the extensions themselves were only allowed to be one week at a time so I left.

by lhnz 4y ago

Silhouette 4y ago

I'm impressed that you managed to get an outside IR35 role with an investment bank in 2020. The rate looks decent or even a little above average for the industry as you say. However IME 100% of big financial firms went umbrella to avoid the IR35 risks that were about to arrive (even if those risks then got deferred by a year) so in reality what they were offering was more equivalent to something in the low £600s outside IR35. Getting £800 for an outside gig would have been a good win at that time.

lhnz 4y ago
I was still on an outside IR35 contract up until October 2020, and then on another at a financial firm on a slightly lower rate until April 2021. You are right though, that it was getting more and more difficult around then. At the first firm they stopped granting outside IR35 contracts during 2020, but were able to grant extensions if one was requested by somebody in leadership however eventually the extensions themselves were only allowed to be one week at a time so I left.