If you’re working as a consultant, freelancer, or a contractor looking to maximise your take home pay (and who isn’t, in this economy?), joining an umbrella company might be just the thing for getting you the most out of your freelance business.
When it comes to umbrella company contractors and permanent workers alike, the most resilient jobs market in the UK is in the Midlands, according to a new jobs report from the Recruitment and Employment Confederation.
Rapid growth has been predicted for Scotland’s energy industry, with the prospects for umbrella company freelancers and limited company contractors very good as a result, according to Scotland’s first minister.
IT contractor demand is still high in the North, with businesses operating across the border are demonstrating increased demand for the third consecutive month.
After it was discovered that he neglected to declare nearly £2 million in earnings, one IT contractor now faces jail time for income tax fraud, it was recently revealed.
Recruitment efforts in the finance sector in the UK has been increasing at a steady basis, according to a new report, leading some experts to predict that contractors working for umbrella companies may be able to benefit from the increased hiring.
For one week this month, a team of contractors working with umbrella companies are banding together to promote freelancing in the UK with the new ‘7 Days in June’ project, it was recently reported.
Contractors with specialised manufacturing and green technology expertise could soon reap the benefits of a newly-approved plan to construct a wind turbine factory on the Isle of Sheppey, it was recently rported.
A recent survey reports that umbrella companies and recruitment firms specialising in providing skilled technical workers to companies in need have only been able to fill four out of every five vacancies, leaving around 20 per cent of positions unfilled due to permanent worker and freelancer shortages in the media, accountancy, finance, interim management, engineering, and IT sectors.
A webinar hosted last month by the Recruitment & Employment Confederation in order to gauge the impact on how workers and employers were approaching Agency Workers Regulations has borne fruit, with the more than 140 participants chiming in on issues such as managing information requests and calculating holiday entitlements.
While private sector firms are hiring temporary staff with highly specialised technical skills, the public sector’s contractor hiring rate has slipped by nearly 15 per cent, according to a recent quarterly report from procurement firm Comensura.
Thanks to a GrowthAccelerator, new business initiative recently unveiled by Vince Cable, £200 million in funding will soon be made available for the brightest businesses in the UK – and industry experts say that contractors that work with umbrella companies are in an excellent position to benefit from the new, positive attention.
The taxman is still struggling to determine what constitutes adequate paperwork for a business or self-employed individual to comply with the Business Records Checks programme.
Whilst some of us were hoping to have seen the end of the doom and gloom that has been dogging us for the last few years, it will be at least another three years before the British high street starts to recover from the recession and even then the prospects of a full recovery before the end of the decade are not looking good.
