Contracting News

A 27-year high in inflation? Not grounds to panic (just yet), but likely a cause for action if you’re a limited company contractor with a mortgage.

With still no Single Enforcement Body emerging, IWORK, Contractor Voice and JobsAware step into the void.

Neither of the prime ministerial candidates, nor the chancellor, are addressing the HMRC policy that’s tragically taken nine lives.

‘Hirers rightly hesitating over hiring plans’ brought IT contractor demand to a more ‘normal’ level in July.

Hiring changes from the Home Office still contain a gap that urgently needs bridging.

Contrary to the business department’s claims to justify its action, now would have been the perfect time to solve the UK’s status crisis.

Do you want to be the football guru on ContractorUK and win a cash prize?

The business department is accused of deafening irony for using the effects of IR35 – ‘cost and uncertainty’ – to justify inaction.

Whitehall’s woes work wonders for late payers, as they keep reforms to fix the UK’s age-old problem off the table, somewhere in the long grass.

Amid the soaring heat, Hays explores somewhere else that’s also hot for many: the IT contractor jobs market.

Much of what’s needed to boost the UK’s flexible labour market is already on the shelf. But revoking IR35 will stay beyond reach.

A review of the whole loan charge debacle, plus resolution for those taxpayers still with us, is the least, decent thing, our next PM should do.

In a heart-breaking development shattering a family, turning a lawyer speechless, and inspiring calls for chancellor Zahawi to intervene, another person has taken their own life over HMRC tax policy.

Right and wrong doesn’t really exist on a platform seeing itself as social. But there is a sweet spot.

Three more avoidance schemes to withdraw from if you’re a contractor get ‘named and shamed.’

‘Unpredictability’ clouds the labour market, on the back of cost-fears and pent-up covid demand appearing to go in the opposite direction to skills shortages.

Hopeful, fearful, and even resigned to it not mattering. Other than being anti-Sunak, UK contracting is mixed about the top job being up for grabs.

‘Proactive transparency’ can bring brollies out of the shadows, potentially even to lance the boil that keeps getting inflamed, often by looking only at the legal position.

On the back of one-time IR35 critic Sajid Javid resigning, the Treasury boss who snubbed directors and imposed 2021’s off-payroll rules walks too, leaving Boris Johnson further in the lurch.

Contractors, the FSCA, and actual victims of Best Employment Services say eight years banned isn’t punishment enough.

But the optimism was only in the short-term, and before record-breaking inflation started to hurt.

Experts can’t find any trace of ‘IFCP’ -- apparently the UK’s ‘most prominent professional membership association for contractor providers.’

Running more than one remote contract at a time, on the sly, is a ruse with consequences we could all end up reaping.

Despite liability resting with umbrella companies in cases like ESL’s, it’s not open-season for you with your contractor expenses.

Excitement still surrounds HPVs, but the elitist universities’ list could put off the best, brightest, most exotic minds.

'Highly technical' court verdict against ESL makes its boss decide to bring his role with the umbrella compliance body to a close.

Posing as a contractor umbrella company, a promoter with ‘chutzpah’ joins the taxman’s blacklist.

‘Reasonable care, skill and diligence’ is required of PSCs. So don’t splurge, fail to file, or put doggie treats on expenses.

Lawyers, tax experts and accountants asked to give the ‘straight answers’ that the Treasury and taxman won’t.

Service providers were recognised last night for their efforts in supporting contractors. 

Soaring costs for organisations shone a favourable light last month on non-permanent hires.

Objections to Reg 80 determinations hit the Revenue, which can’t fix any ‘timeline’ for when it will respond to a single appeal.

Either as a business or consumer (or both), independent techies can now help shape the UK’s National Data Strategy.

The effects of Disguised Remuneration on ‘family formation, stability and breakdown’ have been the total opposite to what the taxman said they would be.

APSCo says a trio of routes for techies from abroad can’t be depended on to fill the short to medium term skills gap.

Some in the contractor sector admit to nursing a ‘few headaches’ – even before the four-day bank holiday weekend started.

With interest rate rises seeming far from over, remortgaging never looked so appealing -- even if it gives you a sting in the short-term.

The drawbacks of a new digital identity scheme will bite hardest where its potential is needed the most.

What MPs on the Public Accounts Committee have recommended; why, and when they want to hear how the taxman is getting on with implementation.

'A kaleidoscope of issues requiring a kaleidoscope of solutions,' is among the realties we tried to impress upon the UK’s DLME.