UK is anybody a self employed electrician not under a scheme?

[boffman]

Hi guys, just after some insight on personal experience of starting a company without being a member of nic,napit ect.

in a nut shell im a qualified electrician with my 2391-52, I work for a company full time and I have a few potential clients lined up, i want to register as a business and do these side jobs legit.

for the time being it is going to be ran as a side business with no conflict of interest with my current employer. So I'm looking into a starting revenue and a way to keep the cost down, i.e. submitting my own certs. i get that the insurances are a must.

has anybody been in the same situation or currently opperating outside of a scheme that can share some information, experience or reccomendation?

thanks in advance

 

[telectrix]

you can do non-notifable jobs and certify them (EIC or MWc). when you go for notifiable work, do a couple of jobs for assessment, then notify once joined. several threads aboult this on the forum.

 

[Mark.fardon]

I’ve recently got back on the tools after previously being in one of the scams err schemes and tried to do non notifiable work and/or use Napit 3rd party sign off but if just didn’t work. Cost/effort/difficulty using Napit or building control for notifiable means you can’t compete with those in a scheme and appear unprofessional regardless of the reality. In the end had to grin and bear it and rejoin niceic - first two jobs paid for the fee so worth it I’d say don’t bother trying to be outside of a scheme if you want to do it properly/legitimately

 

[New-build]

Hi guys, just after some insight on personal experience of starting a company without being a member of nic,napit ect.

in a nut shell im a qualified electrician with my 2391-52, I work for a company full time and I have a few potential clients lined up, i want to register as a business and do these side jobs legit.

for the time being it is going to be ran as a side business with no conflict of interest with my current employer. So I'm looking into a starting revenue and a way to keep the cost down, i.e. submitting my own certs. i get that the insurances are a must.

has anybody been in the same situation or currently opperating outside of a scheme that can share some information, experience or reccomendation?

thanks in advance

Just thinking you might have to declare the second income to HMRC or at least keep a really good record of anything going into you account. You don’t have to be ltd but you’ll need a trading as name like JohnBrownSparx ?

 

[Vortigern]

Depends really whether you are doing domestic or commercial. If the latter there is no reason to join a scheme as notification does not apply to commercial work. Personally I had been doing electrical work for years then Part P came along and I like many other electricians were now not qualified to do domestic, which I resented, so I did commercial only for years but caved in years later and sorted out qualies and scheme membership. As you stand it is not a far place to conform and get Part P scheme membership.

 

[davesparks]

Yes I'm self employed running my own business and am not a member of a scheme.

How do I do it?

Simple, I don't normally touch domestic work.

 

[boffman]

Cheers for the response guys, it will likely be domestic to start off with and I'm fine with regestering as a business.
In a nutshell, make sure there is enough work to justify signing up or just do commercial!

 

[Dustydazzler]

If you are doing domestic work then as much as I don’t agree with how much the scams charge to join , you will sooner or later need to join one of them to notify relevant jobs.
when I went from em0loyed to self employed I had 2 electricians who I used to notify jobs for me (naughty naughty very naughty I know) and bung then a few quid.
but you can’t do it this way forever.
your first big rewire or first 2 consumer unit changes , use this profit to join a scam if you have other work already lined up.
them use these jobs to compete your assessment

 

[richy3333]

You'll have to check your employment contract also to make sure your employer allows this to happen.

 

[boffman]

You'll have to check your employment contract also to make sure your employer allows this to happen.

Hi rich, yeah I've combed through my contract and there is nothing outlined in the contract to stop me going ahead

 

[richy3333]

Awesome. Go for it! You said earlier on it would not impact your employer and if your contract is silent then you’re good to go.

good luck with it. Let us all know how you get on.

 

[Philbro04]

Yes I'm self employed running my own business and am not a member of a scheme.

How do I do it?

Simple, I don't normally touch domestic work.

This is the very reason I have just joined this forum, to ask my next steps.

I’m currently employed by a company doing solely commercial installations and noticed that a lot of our sub contractors provide electrical certification under our company name and are not directly a member of a scheme. (Obviously our company is)

In The very near future I plan to start up and become employed. I know I would be able tocertify jobs done as a sub contractor under the main contractors scheme registration but what if I won any work directly to the client, could my previous work undertaken as a sub contractor be used for assessment to join NICEIC? (My name on certificate but main contractors company name)

or would I have to go the building control route fora handful of jobs to be assessed.

many thanks
Phil

 

[PEG]

Hi,you have already had some great advice,but i would add two other important points...

The first,is stay well away,from the general public.

The second,is,read the above

On countless occasions,lads starting out,make desperate and costly efforts,to get hold of the general public....You need to choose your customers,yourself.

Try and engineer it,so in time,it is the unknown,potential customers,who are making all the efforts,to get you. For example,getting themselves,recommended and vetted,by others you trust,to enable you to "consider" them,as a possible customer.

In my opinion,expensive pyramid nonsenses,such as trust a trooper.....are merely a time consuming and costly way of finding THE worst customers,in creation

 

[Mike Johnson]

Register yourself with the HMRC as a "Sole Trader" that way if your present employer is willing you can keep working for them, meanwhile, at an appropriate rate, you never know they may not want to loose you.

Get Quickbooks for your accounts, quick easy and does the VAT return automatically as you invoice and put in your bills, IMO it's best to voluntary register for VAT as then everything you buy, including fuel is 20% cheaper to you, also you can offset your existing equipment against your profit.

 

[Simon47]

VAT registering also means you have to add VAT to your labour. If your customers are predominantly not VAT registered, then you've added 20% to a big chunk of your price.
It makes no difference to the cost of bought in materials - if VAT registered you reclaim the supply VAT and add it on again at the other end, if not registered you don't reclaim it and it passes through and ends up the same at the other end.
It's really only a benefit if a proportion of your customers are VAT registered.

Registering for VAT doesn't affect being able to claim (e.g.) value of tools put into the business against profits.

And in answer to the first question, I'm not in a scam - but then my electrical work is just a bit of a sideline and the profits wouldn't pay for scam membership. Mostly I went to the trouble of doing a business to regularise doing some work for our church.

 

[Zerax]

The whole "Should I register for VAT" question is an interesting one. It's certainly beneficial in the early stages of a new start-up, as you can reclaim the VAT on all the initial setup costs and tooling etc. But as a long term thing... you're just an unpaid tax collector working for HMRC.

I see that the notorious David Savery has now de-registered... I wonder what his reasons were for doing so.

 

[Mike Johnson]

But being registered as a Sole Trader you can right down the depreciation of your equipment each year against your TAX, you can also claim a proportion of your housing tax against the room you use as your trading place of business, it really is a win win situation being voluntarily registered, I am always surprised by how many people do not understand the tax rules that we operate under.

 

[Zerax]

But being registered as a Sole Trader you can right down the depreciation of your equipment each year against your TAX, you can also claim a proportion of your housing tax against the room you use as your trading place of business, it really is a win win situation being voluntarily registered, I am always surprised by how many people do not understand the tax rules that we operate under.

With respect Mike... I think you're confusing VAT tax with Schedule D income tax. Regardless of whether you're registered for VAT or not, you can still claim for expenses that are 'wholly and exclusively' for the business, including various allowances for business use.

Also, for calculating your income tax liability, you're not allowed 'depreciation', it's called 'capital allowances' instead.