Morale is currently low at HMRC and employees have now been warned that they are in for tough times ahead. Chief Executive, Lesley Strathie, informed staff that they need to be realistic about the challenges they face.
The coalition promised to cut the amount of red tape that umbrella companies and contractors are subjected to and yesterday Vince Cable announced the first stage of the plan.
A decrease in IT budgets could mean that contractors are expected to work harder this year. ReThink Recuitment conducted a study that shows that two thirds of decision makers in IT think workloads will increase over the remaining months of 2010.
Ten of thousands of people, including contractors and freelancers, have been affected by the tax coding problems caused when HMRC migrated their records to a new computer system earlier this year.
Employers and recruiters are becoming more optimistic and their confidence levels have reached their highest level this year, which could benefit those working through umbrella companies.
The European Union has proposed a new set of guidelines for labour reform in the member states but the ARC is concerned that the EU agency workers’ guidelines depict contractors and freelancers in a negative light.
Small businesses in the UK are spending too much time complying with red tape and government bureaucracy, according to a new report by the British Chambers of Commerce (BCC).
Small businesses, umbrella companies and limited company IT contractors will be in a state of 'limbo' until the emergency Budget is delivered on 22nd June.
The REC is understandably delighted that George Osborne has reversed part of the plan to increase NICs. They had opposed the move, as had all business bodies, as the potential cost would have prevented the jobs market recovering fully from the recession.