Working through agencies?

[chilliepot]

How fair is agency work? This is a genuine question.
I started work for an agency. Its the first time I have done this. I dont get paid by the agency, but by a some organisation that calls itself my employer. So the electrical contractor pays the employment agency and the employment agency pays this organisation who then pay me under some sort of “Umbrella Plus” scheme.
This pay office with whom I sign a contract, pay me after some deductions. Its very complicated.

In rounded terms, these people receive say £500 for my weeks work. They then deduct £190 for “company costs”.
Then £23 as “retained income”.
This balance is then compared with a calculation <Hours x national minimum wage £6.31>. The difference between the two is also paid to me as “Profit related pay”. Tax and NI is subtracted from this amount.
Of course I can also claim for the cost of tools I buy and vehicle mileage and other things so this fluctuates.

This all seems to me like a lot of cash in deductions.

Is this reasonable? I mean what is the £190 for? I need the work but I am trying to work out if its all really fair or a bit of a rip-off. Would it be better to be self employed?
Looking for some opinions on this. I've been overseas for some years so what's a better way to go?

 

[Joe9876543210]

I used to work in recruitment at an agency as a consultant. Avoid it they are liars they just want references so they have contacts to call and see if they need any staff.
if they pay you 13ph they will charge roughly £15 the the contractor as a finders fee. So on a 40 hour week they will make £80 a week on you. But of they have 100 men out that's £8000 a week, so £32k a month. Not bad. They consultant takes 20% average of that plus salary. I left because it turns people in liars and it's a stupid sales job at the end of the day!

 

[telectrix]

agencies are thieving scum that should be taken out and shot.

 

[Pete999]

agencies are thieving scum that should be taken out and shot.

Yep I'll 2nd that one

 

[Zebra Stripe]

So if I've understood that properly, if you earn £500 for say 40 hours work, you get £287 ish less tax & NI and the parasites suck up £223 in tasty easy pickings? Wow, what a scam. Although hard to turn down any work when your desperate, think I'd rather starve then feed those w***ers

 

[Plonker 3]

Thats not much more than the minimum wage.

 

[Joe9876543210]

They are bunch of ******s lol. I left working at an agency because I didn't want to be one of those lot. But be sure for one thing.. It isn't easy money.. It really is hard work! Lots of people not wanting to talk to you, getting peopl paid on time, chasing timseheets, unbelievable competition, 12 hour days, people undercutting each other, finding people jobs and then them walking off the job so it makes you look bad so the client goes to the competition. It radially is tough tough tough!

 

[Knobhead]

I must be the lucky one.
Only worked for an agency for three months and enjoyed every minute of it. The agency wanted an experienced multi-skilled engineer and gave me a call, so I got to call the shots.
I had three months of fun.
Electrical? That’s my main trade, fitting, machining and welding all added to the day. To be honest, I’m at my happiest when I’m up to the eyeballs in grease and crap.
I went to see the works MD to tell him I was leaving. At the same time he had been looking for me to offer me the position of works engineer. Too late, I’d signed on the dotted line for a job that near drove me insane with boredom. Same st1t day in day out.

Now I’m retired the same agency keeps giving me a call, “come on you’ll enjoy this one.” I can’t physically do it any more!

If anyone PM’s me I’ll give the name of the agency, but you had better be good.

 

[trev]

Owing to the employment laws agency work is going to become more and more common. It's wrong but the only way to combat it is for everyone not to play their game.
That's never going to happen

 

[BigSi]

I’ve worked through one particular agency for about four years. I had a constant supply of work (normally asked to move to the next job by the client), and worked on some really interesting jobs.


The agency was pretty good, and never missed a payment. I was working via CIS so I paid an umbrella company around £20 per week (for administration), and they took 20% of the weekly wage for the nice tax man. As I was registered as self-employed this would all be included in my end-of-year tax return (often resulting in a refund!).


It might not be for everyone, but I enjoyed it. Some agencies are better than others, so always do some research on who they are and what they charge you.

 

[Adam W]

Working under an umbrella scheme can be beneficial if you put in a lot of expenses, therefore pay less tax - the last one I worked under let you claim for £14 a day for lunch if you were away for longer than 10 hours, £6.50 for breakfast if you left before 6.30 in addition to the 45p per mile, tools, ppe etc.
Some agencies let you shop around for the best deal, others don't, but the general consensus is the agency get backhanders from the umbrella companies for 'recommending' them.
I'm not sure how the tax office view the scheme when you come to do your self-assessment - I suppose I'll find out in a month or so.

 

[chilliepot]

This is true. But we should not have to juggle the expenses to earn a fair wage. I think I'm going to investigate the CIS route. That seems to be an interesting option. Thanks gentlemen.