Hi Guys
I have often wondered how easy it is to become self employed. I have heard all of the stories about how you can get better wages, pay less tax and get your travelling costs back. There must be some self employed drivers on here.
So…if any members are self employed any info would be much appreciated.
Regards
TruckerGeek
I’m self employed. Tax is ■■■■■■■ confusing, you have to look for your work and theres no garantee that the company you’ve been working for for the last six months will be the one you will be working for tomorrow. Other than that as long as you remember to keep up on the paperwork its great. business link is a good website for helping to get you started. As for wages see what the going rate is amongst other drivers in your area because if you price too high you won’t get work if you price too low its not worth your while and you will be disliked. If you can try to find agency prices as well because cutting in a few quid under them will get you the work. Good Luck
find your local business gateway or equivalent. free courses, free advice and free support no matter what type of business you are starting up. my local business seminars covered everything including having the taxman come along to do a course and answer questions. i was going to get an accountant until i realised just how tax and vat is. if you can add and subtract, you can do your own tax returns.
i would recommend barclays for your account. they do everything for you including supplying software and online vaults to keep your account information in. not to mention legal aid to recover late payments and a legal team who will actually write up your contract for you
HMCR do courses on becoming self employed with a lot of useful info & phone numbers these coursed are free as they are designed to help you
A good transport accountant is also a good idea
You will have to factor ALL your costings in
What will be your terms & conditions ie how often are you looking for to be paid 1 mth, 90 days etc 
& if you not paid
TruckerGeek:
Hi GuysI have often wondered how easy it is to become self employed. I have heard all of the stories about how you can get better wages, pay less tax and get your travelling costs back. There must be some self employed drivers on here.
So…if any members are self employed any info would be much appreciated.
Regards
TruckerGeek
I used to be a self employed driver. Its really easy to become one - phone up HMRC Self Employment helpline, answer some questions and hey-presto you’re self employed.
Hard part is finding the work. The decent paying clients tend to want 60 day terms and monthly invoicing meaning it can be 3 months before you get paid for the first days work.
Agencies pay more money to S/E drivers than PAYE but IME, the amount they’re paying is FAR LESS than you’d get on PAYE - they typically pay £1-£2/hr more which barely covers holiday pay. Yes you can claim mileage which will be your biggest expense but as an agency driver as long as you’re not going to the same place for more than 3 months uninterrupted at a time, you can on PAYE too.
make sure you get paid quickly and regularly. don,t forgrt to calculate in to your rates, the days without work and holidays. but the most important thing is get a good reputation then the work will come to you.
it seems that there is still a lot of people that assume you must be better off being self employed, not sure why this is, do people think you don’t pay tax when your self employed or national insurance? as has already been stated if your doing agency work and the difference in rates is only £1 per hour, i garauntee your financially worse off on the se rate by quite some margin! my own personal take on it is, unless your going to do something that potentially will give you some profit i.e a wage + then your wasting your time, all you actually are, is an unpaid accountant for the taxman!
appoligies if that comes accross as a bit harsh but i think a lot of lads are jumping on the self employed wagon without actually looking at the pros n cons.
paul b:
it seems that there is still a lot of people that assume you must be better off being self employed, not sure why this is, do people think you don’t pay tax when your self employed or national insurance? as has already been stated if your doing agency work and the difference in rates is only £1 per hour, i garauntee your financially worse off on the se rate by quite some margin! my own personal take on it is, unless your going to do something that potentially will give you some profit i.e a wage + then your wasting your time, all you actually are, is an unpaid accountant for the taxman!
appoligies if that comes accross as a bit harsh but i think a lot of lads are jumping on the self employed wagon without actually looking at the pros n cons.
Dosent seem that harsh to me
I did look into this last year even done some of the HMCR courses ( which I would recommend ) also spoke with a transport accountant did have several comp willing to take me on as self employed
This is why I said take ALL cost into account your wages paying a CPC holder ( unless you have 1 ) repairs MOT time off general running cost of vehicle & trailer ( if applicable ) sure there are a few more things but cant remember ( is late as just finished night shift so nearly my bed time 
)
I remember reading that all the relevant agencies involved did not agree that a self employed driver (goods or passengers) could be self employed without a raft of clauses.
One quote from that I had filed away was this one from VOSA
‘Self-employed driver’ means anyone whose main occupation is to transport passengers or goods by road for hire or reward within the meaning of Community legislation under cover of a Community licence or any other professional authorisation to carry out such transport, who is entitled to work for himself and who is not tied to an employer by an employment contract or by any other type of working hierarchical relationship, who is free to organise the relevant working activities, whose income depends directly on the profits made and who has the freedom, individually or through a co-operation between self-employed drivers, to have commercial relations with several customers"
I appreciate that many “self employed” drivers are actually just freelance drivers, like myself, but reading the above quote would also imply that a self employed driver requires their own operators licence.
Alliance and Leicester Commercial bank do free banking provided you pay in a grand per month.Anything under that and its a fiver a month.
paul b:
it seems that there is still a lot of people that assume you must be better off being self employed, not sure why this is, do people think you don’t pay tax when your self employed or national insurance? as has already been stated if your doing agency work and the difference in rates is only £1 per hour, i garauntee your financially worse off on the se rate by quite some margin! my own personal take on it is, unless your going to do something that potentially will give you some profit i.e a wage + then your wasting your time, all you actually are, is an unpaid accountant for the taxman!
appoligies if that comes accross as a bit harsh but i think a lot of lads are jumping on the self employed wagon without actually looking at the pros n cons.
There are ways and means… I do know of someone who is 100% legit… he hasnt drawn a wage above the maximum for when you become due for income tax for a number of years… so pays nothing! but he has a lovely house, brand new BMW car every couple yers, takes multiple holdays abroad.
and its 100% legal and above board, cash on the hip he may be short of… but he has a better life than me… going self employed has a lot of risks, but if you do it right (and legal) the benefits can be worth it
I’d second that Rikki. Never cooked my books, never did cash in hand - not that there was the opportunity due to working with large companies, but with careful application of everything I claimed for I could write loads of money off. Take travel to work - 60 mile round trip at 40p per mile is £24 you’ve not earned as far as the tax man and tax credits are concerned.
there is indeed ways and means BUT there has to be some cash to play with in the first place, doing agency work @£9 per hour dosn’t get you a big house and a new beamer no matter how you jugle your figures.
the trouble is people go self employed and always think they’ve found a new angle, they’re going to claim this and claim that and lifes going to be a bed of roses, unfortunately the taxman has seen it ALL before, you may think you’ve pulled it off when they accept your figures for a year or two but remember they can investigate any years figures anytime they like going back five years or more, take it from me, if they find any discreponcies for one year they will look very closely at all years and what they say you owe is what you’ll be paying weather you or you accountant agree with it or not, they have the final say and are all powerfull when it comes to collecting their debt, forget appeals and time to pay, if they give you 21 days to pay 8k thats exactly what you’ve got, can’t find the money? they can come and take everything you’ve got and theres not a thing you can do about it! thats obviously an extreme example but the point i’m trying to make is, if your doing something that only pays a wage, you will always be better off on paye, you get holiday pay + any other bennefits and your employer is paying half your ni contributions not to mention pensions etc and if your an agency driver you can still claim everything you would’ve claimed as self employed the difference is of coarse you have to pay the tax first then claim it back, personally after 27 years of being self employed and recently taking a job on paye, i know which i prefer but everyone makes they’re own choices.
something else for you to think about before going self employed
Everyones right in what has been previously posted.
Also there are those who require the financial security of a regular income (to pay the morgage, feed the kids etc) that being employed by someone else (paying PAYE etc) gives you.
There are also those who dont need that financial security due to whatever reason, and can enjoy the flexable lifestyle of working ad-hoc for 3rd parties inc agencies. Knowing full well that the garantee of regular work, and the income it provides isnt always there.
Which is why for those there comes a point for those the 2nd catagory to decide IF its viable for them to go self employed. Many inc myself will have spent many hours researching, & pondering the pros & cons of taking that giant step to self employment. but in the end its down to the individual to make that choice, and to live with it
Rikki-UK:
There are ways and means… I do know of someone who is 100% legit… he hasnt drawn a wage above the maximum for when you become due for income tax for a number of years… so pays nothing!
As each invoice is paid to me, all you have to do is sweep across into the companies savings account enough to cover all your obligations to HMRC, and possibly a little extra to cover those rainy days
Personnelly I input on a spreadsheet what Ive been paid, it calculates whats due, & then I move to savings: VAT ££s
corporation tax ££`s
25% of gross profit, for that rainy day
I know full well that as long as the moneys in the bank to pay my obligations to HMRC, then I won`t have to worry. But I know that any monies left over at the end of the year. will be a nice little windfall. A bit like getting a years wages all at once
Rikki-UK:
and its 100% legal and above board, cash on the hip he may be short of… but he has a better life than me… going self employed has a lot of risks, but if you do it right (and legal) the benefits can be worth it
Personnelly I wouldnt have gone SE if I wasn`t financially secure, and got my 30 yrs of NI.
peirre:
Personnelly I wouldnt have gone SE if I wasn`t financially secure, and got my 30 yrs of NI.
NI is only £2.80 per week
paul b:
there is indeed ways and means BUT there has to be some cash to play with in the first place, doing agency work @£9 per hour dosn’t get you a big house and a new beamer no matter how you jugle your figures.
I own two houses. Most of my driving career has been with agencies save a few years self employed. Apart from S/E, I’ve only had one job that paid over £9/hr.
If you don’t ■■■■ your money up the wall on a Friday and Saturday night or turn it into smoke then you can afford such things.
animal:
NI is only £2.80 per week
Indeed it is almost, You pay Class 2 National Insurance contributions at a flat rate of £2.40 a week if your earnings are above £5,075 per year (2010-11).
But as Ive posted elsewhere for class 1 NICs it depends where you fall within the bands as to what your obligations are to HMRC hmrc.gov.uk/paye/rates-thresholds.htm
Also as you probably know, HMRC run those rather fine business education courses will quite happily tell you that drawing a wage between the lower earnings level (LEL) and the earnings threshold (ET) means you don`t need to pay anything. its only when you get above the (ET) do you start paying 11%
Conor:
paul b:
there is indeed ways and means BUT there has to be some cash to play with in the first place, doing agency work @£9 per hour dosn’t get you a big house and a new beamer no matter how you jugle your figures.I own two houses. Most of my driving career has been with agencies save a few years self employed. Apart from S/E, I’ve only had one job that paid over £9/hr.
If you don’t ■■■■ your money up the wall on a Friday and Saturday night or turn it into smoke then you can afford such things.
my point is, you’ve havnt got what you’ve got through being self employed, you’ve got it by being carefull with your money just the same as you would’ve done if you worked for a firm on paye for 20 years.
simple fact is, unless there is a potential profit ( to me thats money over and above what you can earn as a wage) in what you plan on doing, there is no benefit to going s/e, agencies are queing up to take on s/e drivers, why? because @ £1 per hour more, they are, in reality getting a cheaper driver, so who’s standing the cost to give them that saving?
my personal take on it would be unless your doing something that could generate £800+ per week then your better off on paye, especially agency work where you can still claim for everything against your tax without any of the costs of being self employed.
it’s each to their own and i wouldn’t knock anybody for trying to earn more money BUT the automatic assumtion that a lot of people seem to have that going self employed means more money in the bank, is unfortunately is a bit of a myth.