Low self esteem coders

[ruethewhirl]

Been a permie for 8 years now, done everything MS from Access 97 to C# 3.5.

About to be made redundant, but can't get my head around the contractor rates. Old muggins here can't be worth THAT much?!

[MPwannadecentincome]

do the sums properly, noting that:

* you do not get paid for days when you are sick
* you do not get paid holidays
* you do not get a pension
* you do not get health / dental cover, life cover
* you do not get paid when you go on a training course
* you have to pay for the training course yourself
* you need to put some money aside for a rainy day on the bench

So, how much is left after taking into account those items you need - you may not care about all the items above.

Then on the plus side, if you are working, you get to take long holidays enjoying all the money you have earnt!

[TheFaQQer]

Old muggins here can't be worth THAT much?!

You probably aren't.

I could never get my head round how much I was billed out for as a consultant, which is more than I earn now by a significant margin.

[Jaws]

do the sums properly, noting that:

* you do not get paid for days when you are sick
* you do not get paid holidays
* you do not get a pension
* you do not get health / dental cover, life cover
* you do not get paid when you go on a training course
* you have to pay for the training course yourself
* you need to put some money aside for a rainy day on the bench

So, how much is left after taking into account those items you need - you may not care about all the items above.

Then on the plus side, if you are working, you get to take long holidays enjoying all the money you have earnt!

To add to that, if you're running a limited co you also need to take into account all the set up costs. That and having to wait approx 2 months before I first saw any pay certainly made a dent in the money I'd saved prior to going contracting and that was with no downtime between leaving permie job and starting the first contract

[shoes]

Been a permie for 8 years now, done everything MS from Access 97 to C# 3.5.

About to be made redundant, but can't get my head around the contractor rates. Old muggins here can't be worth THAT much?!

Should have looked 8 years ago.

Doh.

[Gonzo]

do the sums properly, noting that:

* you do not get paid for days when you are sick
* you do not get paid holidays
* you do not get a pension
* you do not get health / dental cover, life cover
* you do not get paid when you go on a training course
* you have to pay for the training course yourself
* you need to put some money aside for a rainy day on the bench

So, how much is left after taking into account those items you need - you may not care about all the items above.

Then on the plus side, if you are working, you get to take long holidays enjoying all the money you have earnt!

Don't forget to add travel and accommodation. You will probably have to take contracts away from where you live (not always necessary) but you are not going to move house for a three-month contract.

[MPwannadecentincome]

I could never get my head round how much I was billed out for as a consultant, which is more than I earn now by a significant margin.

That's simple - the big consultancy company that billed you out as a consultancy had to not only pay your wages, but that of your manager, his manager, the HR dept, the sales dept, the marketing dept, the 'send internal communications to all staff' dept, the finance dept, the treasury dept, project management office, the r&d dept etc etc as well as pay for the days you were not billable, were on training etc etc and then the profits for the shareholders.

[thunderlizard]

All of that is absolutely true but I'm still surprised that clients always accept that so easily. After all, the client doesn't get very much added value from all that big consultancy dead weight.

Value is about how much profit your work brings for your customer. There's no point trying to work out the intrinsic value of your software development. In the 90s people were saying how crazy it was that contractors were getting paid as much as premiership footballers. I was saying if premiership footballers can get paid as much as premiership footballers, why shouldn't contractors?

[MPwannadecentincome]

All of that is absolutely true but I'm still surprised that clients always accept that so easily. After all, the client doesn't get very much added value from all that big consultancy dead weight.

Well its often about the 'safe' choice. Getting a system developed by a consultancy group means that they can have a "proper" contract, it might be fixed price, they can be sued, lots of staff might be supplied in one go, some expertise they have may be of some use, etc etc.

This is easier to sell to the board - remember when it was said you could never get fired for buying IBM, well its a similar mentality here, after all can you imagine the management headache of getting lots of contractors in on a daily rate in comparison, yes there is money to be saved but...?

Of course none of that means that the client gets a 'better' system!

[DimPrawn]

Been a permie for 8 years now, done everything MS from Access 97 to C# 3.5.

About to be made redundant, but can't get my head around the contractor rates. Old muggins here can't be worth THAT much?!

Incredible isn't it that you can get maybe £200/day as a contractor with no sick pay, no holiday pay, accountancy costs to pay, IR35 taxes to pay or contract reviews to pay, no free training, no income between contracts, no free health care, no pension contributions paid, no free life insurance.

I mean, it's like winning the lottery man!