Hiring your first employee- a UK guide
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Hiring your first employee- a UK guide
1–10 of 17 posts
Re: Hiring your first employee- a UK guide
#2Very useful for new founders, although as you quite rightly point out if you pay a half-decent accountancy firm to handle your company finances they should be sorting most of this out for you!
Re: Hiring your first employee- a UK guide
#3Very useful for new founders, although as you quite rightly point out if you pay a half-decent accountancy firm to handle your company finances they should be sorting most of this out for you!
Glad it helped- I found the need for Employer's Liability Insurance to be the biggest surprise, so wanted to flag that up to people.
Re: Hiring your first employee- a UK guide
#4Nice concise guide. Thank You.
Re: Hiring your first employee- a UK guide
#5Very useful for new founders, although as you quite rightly point out if you pay a half-decent accountancy firm to handle your company finances they should be sorting most of this out for you!
Glad it helped- I found the need for Employer's Liability Insurance to be the biggest surprise, so wanted to flag that up to people.
It's also be worth knowing that some insurance deals aimed at small businesses bundle up several of the most useful/legally required types of insurance, including Employer's Liability.
For example, my contracting company took out a policy for the Professional Indemnity cover, but it also comes with some Public Liability and sufficient Employer's Liability cover to meet statutory obligations if we take on employees.
I don't know whether this works out cheaper than finding separate policies for exactly what you need, so obviously please do your homework if you're in a position of needing this type of cover.
Re: Hiring your first employee- a UK guide
#6Earlier quoted context omitted.
Glad it helped- I found the need for Employer's Liability Insurance to be the biggest surprise, so wanted to flag that up to people.
It's also be worth knowing that some insurance deals aimed at small businesses bundle up several of the most useful/legally required types of insurance, including Employer's Liability. For example, my contracting company took out a policy for the Professional Indemnity cover, but it also comes with some Public Liability and sufficient Employer's Liability cover to meet statutory obligations if we take on employees. I…
Often you'll buy what's called a 'commercial combined' policy, which will usually cover professional indemnity, employer's liability and product liability (if you sell things), plus extensions such as theft cover.
EL is the only compulsory insurance which applies to all private sector employers, although in certain industries you will have additional requirements (e.g. conveyancers have to purchase professional indemnity insurance).
Re: Hiring your first employee- a UK guide
#7I'm curious: Could you not simply designate the new hire a 'contractor' since they are working from their own premises? You could then save having to deal with all the employee paperwork and insurance...?
Re: Hiring your first employee- a UK guide
#8I'm curious: Could you not simply designate the new hire a 'contractor' since they are working from their own premises? You could then save having to deal with all the employee paperwork and insurance...?
You have to be pretty careful with this sort of thing. You can't just say someone is a contractor and they become so. This is covered by something called 'IR35'.
What this basically says, is if someone looks like an employee, they're doing the job of an employee, then they are an employee, whether you like it or not.
Most UK IT contractors will be pretty familiar with this situation, and the ways to avoid being caught out by it.
However, as my employee is mostly customer service, admin etc, and doesn't work for anyone else, I don't think there's a way round it for me!
Re: Hiring your first employee- a UK guide
#9I'm curious: Could you not simply designate the new hire a 'contractor' since they are working from their own premises? You could then save having to deal with all the employee paperwork and insurance...?
You have to be pretty careful with this sort of thing. You can't just say someone is a contractor and they become so. This is covered by something called 'IR35'. What this basically says, is if someone looks like an employee, they're doing the job of an employee, then they are an employee, whether you like it or not. Most UK IT contractors will be pretty familiar with this situation, and the ways to avoid being caugh…
I wonder if this IR35 issue also extends to other european citizens working as freelancers. I know nothing on UK law, but common sense dictates it does not forbid hiring other europeans.
It might be possible to hire remote freelancers based on other european startup hubs without being affected by IR35.
Re: Hiring your first employee- a UK guide
#10I'm curious: Could you not simply designate the new hire a 'contractor' since they are working from their own premises? You could then save having to deal with all the employee paperwork and insurance...?
http://www.hmrc.gov.uk/employment-status/index.htm#1 would seem to indicate that it's similar to Canada & USA -- if the employer has control over the hours and way the work is performed, you don't get a choice over the employment status. The location really doesn't matter.