Discuss Self employed electricians mate in the Electrical Forum area at ElectriciansForums.net

Welcome to ElectriciansForums.net - The American Electrical Advice Forum
Head straight to the main forums to chat by click here:   American Electrical Advice Forum

Shpark

-
Reaction score
10
I’m currently training to be a spark. I’ve got my level 3 C & G quals. I’m currently working as a mate to gain experience and earn a bit, but I’m getting stung by being paid by a payroll firm. Between having to pay my NI and tax and their NI and fees, I’m loosing nearly 150 a week. Does anyone know how I can do this on a self employed basis? Will it benefit me more? Will I need my own insurance. Help please.

Thanks In advance
 
see if the agency does CIS self-employed.you would need to register with hmrc for self-assessment. yhis can be done on line.
 
Make sure you're cis. They've ilegally removed from that scheme and created a highly profitable (to them) conduit umbrella PAYE, whereby you're self employed and an employee of yourself. I have tirelessly campaigned and reported these vile practices to the competition watch dog and HMRC. None of them care. On a PAYE umbrella you end up paying 30+% tax and ni. They will lie and say you're not working under your own jurisdiction and will need to be employed which is pure lies. If your tools get nicked you cannot claim against PAYE. If you need more tools you cannot claim against PAYE. If your PAYE they shoukd provide ppe. You will be pumped if you dont have ppe. You have to pay your holidays yourself. It is cheaper to go limited company as my accountant charges £20 pw and he will suck my balls for that. Whereas as a payroll charge is wasted. I've been gladly banned from plenty of agents. Happy to I won't pay there fees. And I've thought and beat them all.

I get an agent to get me on site. Stick a decent few weeks in for a reasonable gaffer and then offer to subbie for them and invoice direct. Slowly You will build a small network of reliable contractors who get projects in your area..You will get an increase in hourly wage because the scumbag agent isnt zapping 20% each week (passive income ) and the contractor will be paying less fees.

But be warned the sparkies arnt you friends either.. there is a big trend at the moment of using and abusing mates and improvers outside their purpose e.g not working alone and basically burning up mates on heavily under priced contracts or work that has been subbed out numerous times and theres no fat on the job just bones and graft. . The industry is now so short term and only thinking of the current project, they care not for your learning and guidance or posterity just getting themselves through a badly priced job. and the agents are complicit in this. Don't fall into that trap pal.
I had to finish my nvq photo evidence at home bring ing home galv unistrut and and conduit and set up install in my garage...because the only mate/improvers work I could get was bang in the commissioning zone of a project and you'd be working like you're on price and wouldn't have time to evidence any of it.

I'm bitter and resentful to the whole trade for the treatment, I've received from sparks as a mate/improver, latterly as a subbie (being subbie bashed) and battles with greedy agents. I hate them all. I wouldnt hesitate to shaft any of them in a second that my personal interest where at conflict. We're being laughed at by the other trades who are chilling and earning. Pipe fitters never break a sweat, ductors are always laughing. Sparks are miserable. Good luck on your way up very greasy pole that is sparkydom. Sorry for the cynicism but you'll know by the time your gold card arrives what I mean.
 
Also if you go Limited get yourself on the flat rate VAT scheme so you add VAT to your invoices to agent/payroll company or direct contractor and and keep about 8% p.w on top. Adds up to a decent holiday each year. Only downside is you can't claim vat for purchases exceeding £2000 which shouldn't be a huge issue for a subbie.
 
Don't purchase their fake insurance products. this not even white labelling, its just bundling their own liability insurance cover and charging you a profitable fee of 6 quid a week. The marginal cost of their insurance is pennies...This is totally illegal because you have to be registered by the FSCA to sell insurance products. The fake insurance wont be itemized on your payslip by company and you won't be given a policy ref. And the policy has not been sourced in a competative manner in the market.. The law states it is illegal to back date an insurance policy. I.e if you start a job on a Monday and you get their insurance on a Friday they will promise you it will cover you from Monday totally illegal and it won't cover you at all. If it came to some damage or problem you caused on site, their insurer would drop you like hot turd. No details of the insurance contravt will be provided so you wont know what it covers in what event. Possibly them preventing you from getting a PROPER insurance policy which may really cover you.. The site main contractor will have insurance for your presence, the electrical contractor will have insurance for you in fact you will be over insured the second you walk on site. But the agent will promise you can only get on site with insurance. The agents are a joke. They actually make upto 80% of the payroll companies fee charge to you as a backhanded.. Basic law states it is illegal to charge an employment agency contractor or worker to process their payroll.. there has been no regulation of these industries at all and hence why they're a law into themselves. All colluding and acting like cartels. Their is no competition in their pricing which is fixed amongst themselves. When you start looking at their accounts and financial statments its just a huge slush fund where builders are being fleeced and who are too busy making a living to to do anything about it. But yet another moan from me.
 
You need to self promote. A lot. Get your name out there and make people see it and recognize it. Create a website, give out business cards and door-to-door flyers.
 
Last edited by a moderator:
if pay is non negotiable i walk away, and have done 3 times and im just finishing my apprenticeship, i know my worth, which is why i earn £4 more per hour than sjib rates

i have no kids so can do unreasonable hours so long as im fairly paid for it, couldnt care less if its half 4 , if the job im on isnt finished i stay around and get it done to save coming back if theres less than 2 hours of work to do

its all about how much profit you bring in/quality of work, if you consistently hit and exceed targets then you wont find it hard to get onto sites

the difference between me and most other tradies is if a job is supposed to take 2 hours ill try and get it done in 1 hour sweating buckets and try squeeze in more jobs that day, other guys i worked with consistently took double the quoted time to complete works, needless to say they are no longer employed

its easy for me to say in a country that consists of less than 6.5million people, no shortage of electrical work in scotland, new offshore turbines, new confrence centres, new bypasses , new hotels for the new bypass, upgrades to existing buildings around bypass

if youre willing to travel i can probably get you onto a site this year near inverness
 
I’m getting paid very handsomely, I juts need advice on being self employed because the payroll firm are riding me sideways
like the other guys have said, worth speaking to the main electrical contractor and discuss going as LTD, worked out better for them , but they had to wait 3 months between payments
 
The problem you have here, is that as a ‘Mate’, you are supervised.
Being supervised means you do not meet the criteria for being considered self employed.
As far as I am aware, until you become qualified, the only way round this is to set up a Ltd Co.
 
Also if you go Limited get yourself on the flat rate VAT scheme so you add VAT to your invoices to agent/payroll company or direct contractor and and keep about 8% p.w on top. Adds up to a decent holiday each year. Only downside is you can't claim vat for purchases exceeding £2000 which shouldn't be a huge issue for a subbie.

How can registering for flat rate vat be a win for you

The vat threshold is about £84k this year .... Good going for a mate
 
on gross of £457.26, you'd be paying 20% CIS tax. that's £91.45, so would you be better off when you get some back end of financial year, and have to pay s/e NI.
 
on gross of £457.26, you'd be paying 20% CIS tax. that's £91.45, so would you be better off when you get some back end of financial year, and have to pay s/e NI.
I have not got a clue how any of this works, I just want to do my job and not get conned. Saying that, surly I can go self employed and take home my top line and juts pay my own tax and NI and not pay their employers national insurance and their fees
 
with CIS you get stopped 20% of gross. at end of year you claim back tax on your personal allowance ( about£11,000)and justifiable expenses, so you'd get back a min. of £2,200 on your pa.
 
with CIS you get stopped 20% of gross. at end of year you claim back tax on your personal allowance ( about£11,000)and justifiable expenses, so you'd get back a min. of £2,200 on your pa.
The gross is £520 not £457.26.
Even with the pay roll company’s fee the gross would be £500. Not sure whether the £2.20 for insurance has been deducted before or after tax and NI contributions.
From the pay slip, nothing has been allowed for expenses, which would reduce both his tax and NI liabilities.
 
I have not got a clue how any of this works, I just want to do my job and not get conned. Saying that, surly I can go self employed and take home my top line and juts pay my own tax and NI and not pay their employers national insurance and their fees

Go and speak to a proper accountant...
 

Reply to Self employed electricians mate in the Electrical Forum area at ElectriciansForums.net

OFFICIAL SPONSORS

Electrical Goods - Electrical Tools - Brand Names Electrician Courses Green Electrical Goods PCB Way Electrical Goods - Electrical Tools - Brand Names Pushfit Wire Connectors Electric Underfloor Heating Electrician Courses
These Official Forum Sponsors May Provide Discounts to Regular Forum Members - If you would like to sponsor us then CLICK HERE and post a thread with who you are, and we'll send you some stats etc

YOUR Unread Posts

Electrical Forum

Welcome to the Electrical Forum at ElectriciansForums.net. The friendliest electrical forum online. General electrical questions and answers can be found in the electrical forum.
This website was designed, optimised and is hosted by Untold Media. Operating under the name Untold Media since 2001.
Back
Top
AdBlock Detected

We get it, advertisements are annoying!

Sure, ad-blocking software does a great job at blocking ads, but it also blocks useful features of our website. For the best site experience please disable your AdBlocker.

I've Disabled AdBlock