unlikely to work as a contractor on this visa

Hi guys,
Some people in this forum have mentioned that people with entrepreneur visa can work as contractors.

However, my friend working for recruitment agencies said that they wouldn't give contract to those who were on entrepreneur visa, even though the visa does not restrict them from working as a contractor under their limited company. He said that most recruitment agencies wouldn't do it.

So you'd better think twice if contracting is your plan.

Xin

xtong wrote:Hi guys,
Some people in this forum have mentioned that people with entrepreneur visa can work as contractors.

There were referring to doing this through their own company rather than a contacting agency. It's completely obvious that working for an outside agency is not acceptable.

Why is there a recruitment agency in between two companies?

The contract will be between TWO companies. Your company and the other company. Recruitment companies find people to work for companies. They don't find companies to work for companies.

Kindly understand the definition of 'RECRUITMENT'

Recruitment agencies provide jobs to individuals. You are asking the wrong people.

esic_sonia wrote:Recruitment agencies provide jobs to individuals. You are asking the wrong people.

The visa is also for individuals who are self-employed, not just for company directors. Recruitment agencies do often provide services for self-employed individuals.

sm12 wrote:

esic_sonia wrote:Recruitment agencies provide jobs to individuals. You are asking the wrong people.

The visa is also for individuals who are self-employed, not just for company directors. Recruitment agencies do often provide services for self-employed individuals.

That still come under contract... not job!

Hi xtong,
I am not sure I agree with you. We have hired people on contract (through their own limited companies) who are on t1 entrepreneur.

Which is the company that told you that ? I speak to all firms here and they dont care as long as you are working for your own limited company.

Please do not confuse people here. Please backup your fact with name of company.

For your doubt I ll tell you how it exactly works the following way.

There are three companies in the equation:
1) You(visa holder) who is running a limited company to provide his/her services.
2) Head hunter/ also always an umbrella company.
3) Client/ Organisation which wants you as a resource.

visa holder gets contacted by head hunters on behalf of an organisation for their projects.

After the meeting process once the organisation decides to give the contract to this person, he is informed of this through the head hunter.

Once the client wants to hire your company for its services, it does not do a direct contract with you. No big company does it as they dont want to deal with hundreds of contracts. And for this purpose they already have 'one' large scale contract with the headhunting firm/umbrella company.
This headhunting/umbrella company then signs up all the contractors/your limited company.

So in essence its two back to back contracts. One between client and umbrella company. Next one between Umbrella company and your company.

And both invoice each other back to back.
This is how it had been working for ages around the world.

And this whole equation, no one ever becomes an employee of the other.
They are all providing their company's services.

Hope this helps.

Hi guys,
Many clients won't sign a contract directly with your limited company. They would usually sign a contract with a recruitment agency. Then the agency will sign another contract with your company.

Yet, my friend who is working for HAYS, one of the biggest recruitment agencies here in London said that many agencies now were unwilling to give contract to those who are on entrepreneur visa.

So you may find yourself in a very awkward position if you want to work as a contractor on entrepreneur visa.

Lucapooka wrote:

xtong wrote:Hi guys,
Some people in this forum have mentioned that people with entrepreneur visa can work as contractors.

There were referring to doing this through their own company rather than a contacting agency. It's completely obvious that working for an outside agency is not acceptable.

The fact is that more and more clients are unwilling to sign contract directly with contractors. They would usually go through a recruitment agency, which means that they sign a contract with the agency, then the agency sign a contract with contractor.

hi, I have hired through hays and alexander mann.. and they have signed contract with limited companies of t1 visa holders..

can you name a contact there ?

there is no legal issue here.. as they are signing the contract with another limited company, not the visa holder directly in anyway, just that it happens to be that the director of the business happens to be a visa holder. So its a business to business contract, not person to person, so there is no problem.

Also Sorry Xtong-


I have just checked with UKBA/Home Office on the phone just to be sure again.

And they have reconfirmed it.

They confirmed to me that you can work as a contractor/consultant on a client site or anything you name it and in any business..(for the 200k route)

As long as you only remain an employee of the business you have setup and are working on its behalf.

So this sorted.

Thanks,

take this too from a Solicitor..


http://www.justanswer.com/uk-immigratio ... -work.html

Finally result is we can work as IT contractor through agency .Please correct me if i'm wrong.

cooldue- sorry if you cant make it out till now then I am in loss of words.

rahulsingh1 wrote:Also Sorry Xtong-


I have just checked with UKBA/Home Office on the phone just to be sure again.

And they have reconfirmed it.

They confirmed to me that you can work as a contractor/consultant on a client site or anything you name it and in any business..(for the 200k route)

As long as you only remain an employee of the business you have setup and are working on its behalf.

So this sorted.

Thanks,

That's good then. I believe it would be the same for Venture Capital (£50,000) ones too.

rahulsingh1 wrote:hi, I have hired through hays and alexander mann.. and they have signed contract with limited companies of t1 visa holders..

can you name a contact there ?

there is no legal issue here.. as they are signing the contract with another limited company, not the visa holder directly in anyway, just that it happens to be that the director of the business happens to be a visa holder. So its a business to business contract, not person to person, so there is no problem.

My friend said, going forward, they would be unwilling to sign contract with T1 entrepreneur visa holder.

BTW, may I ask what you do? Are you a recruiter?

Hi guys,
I am just providing the information here. What I found from my experience and my friend's experience is that some immigration lawyers just encouraged us to apply for this visa without fulling explaining to us the cons.

Yes, it seems that we can work as contractors, but we need to seriously consider 1) if we can get contracts on this visa 2) how to deal with the IR35 issue.

Hi xtong-

I run an ecommerce startup employing 4 people in the UK.
And I also have a strategy consulting business, which I run on the side.

Did your friend explain why they would be doing so ? Any particular reason ?


About IR35 - IR35 is an age old issue introduced in early 2000s by HMRC which has been tackled till now. no one would be contracting if they would be afraid of IR35. IR35 is like a danger you carry, like when you carry a danger of a car accident while driving a car. But IR35 is out of the scope of this thread I am afraid. Please done confuse ppl by introducing new jargons here.

rahulsingh1 wrote:Hi xtong-

I run an ecommerce startup employing 4 people in the UK.
And I also have a strategy consulting business, which I run on the side.

Did your friend explain why they would be doing so ? Any particular reason ?


About IR35 - IR35 is an age old issue introduced in early 2000s by HMRC which has been tackled till now. no one would be contracting if they would be afraid of IR35. IR35 is like a danger you carry, like when you carry a danger of a car accident while driving a car. But IR35 is out of the scope of this thread I am afraid. Please done confuse ppl by introducing new jargons here.

The problem is that if a contractor was caught by IR35, he or she would be seen as employee instead of contractor of the client. Yet the entrepreneur visa prevents us from being an employee. This is one of the reasons that recruitment agencies are unwilling to give contract to people with entrepreneur visa. They don't know what will happen if someone with entrepreneur visa get caught by IR35.

actually in the contrary- it is more safer to do contracting under entrepreneur visa- because if hmrc notices you, you would be ruled out as an employee because you cannot become one.

Another thing is, that is not an issue even if they deem you as an employee because under entrepreneur visa you can be self employed as well. And self employed people pay same taxes as any normal employee. So there is no risk.

Please let your friend know this..

let us know what your friend thinks now..

rahulsingh1 wrote: Another thing is, that is not an issue even if they deem you as an employee because under entrepreneur visa you can be self employed as well. And self employed people pay same taxes as any normal employee. So there is no risk.

Please let your friend know this..

let us know what your friend thinks now..

Hi all,

I have 2 questions for you guys:

1) I have been reading the posts regularly and recruiters have been approaching me also. Did anybody get a recruitment contract yet on the Entrepreneur visa or faced any problems?

2) I have an interview coming up very soon, can I show the UKBA that I have missed those contracts as that is like business lost?

I was misguided by my lawyer, actually he has charged me without any knowledge about this tier and this forum has become my last resort, pls Help.

Thanks,

Dear Rahulsingh1,
Could you please kindly advise if this rule (working as a contractet through own ltd company) applies to both 200k and 50k route Tier 1 (E) visa holders?

Many thanks and best Regards

[quote="rahulsingh1"]Also Sorry Xtong-


I have just checked with UKBA/Home Office on the phone just to be sure again.

And they have reconfirmed it.

They confirmed to me that you can work as a contractor/consultant on a client site or anything you name it and in any business..(for the 200k route)

As long as you only remain an employee of the business you have setup and are working on its behalf.

So this sorted.

Thanks,[/quote]

rahulsingh1 wrote:actually in the contrary- it is more safer to do contracting under entrepreneur visa- because if hmrc notices you, you would be ruled out as an employee because you cannot become one.

Another thing is, that is not an issue even if they deem you as an employee because under entrepreneur visa you can be self employed as well. And self employed people pay same taxes as any normal employee. So there is no risk.

Please let your friend know this..

let us know what your friend thinks now..

Let me explain. My point of view may be slightly different i.e. from tax and HMRC point of view.

Working through umbrella companies means that these company act as your employer in order to avoid the NI contributions by your limited company.

This practice is highly disregarded by the HMRC and one may fall in to IR35 legislation. From 6 April 2013 the IR35 rules are further tightened.

Briefly, IR35 means that if fall under this legislation, HMRC will consider there is no limited company and you will be liable to pay much higher tax liability and NIC. Same as what an employee pays if there was no limited company.

I personally think you do not need an umbrella companies for your contracts. All you need is to register as a self employed with HMRC instead of limited company. Under this arrangement you will pay class 2 NIC (2.65 per week) and class 4 NIC based on your profits.

There is income tax implications as well but you will be able to claim deduction of your business expenditure which under IR35 you can't (with exceptions).

This arrangement is no more different than what Umbrella companies do. By registering as self employed with HMRC is pretty straight forward.

The only downside is that you expose yourself to your creditors personally. It means that if you unable to pay your business debts you will be personally liable. In addition, Class 4 NIC will also be payable but this will be based on your profits.

As a contractor I do not see many creditors.

I hope this helps.

I know couple of people who work as contractors on this visa.
I have one person working for us as a contractor who is on this visa. We pay his limited company.

I dont even know why this discussion is present. because legally you are allowed to be self employed as well under this route. So you can work as a contractor even without the ltd company route.

Its self explanatory.

last_resort wrote:

rahulsingh1 wrote: Another thing is, that is not an issue even if they deem you as an employee because under entrepreneur visa you can be self employed as well. And self employed people pay same taxes as any normal employee. So there is no risk.

Please let your friend know this..

let us know what your friend thinks now..

Hi all,

I have 2 questions for you guys:

1) I have been reading the posts regularly and recruiters have been approaching me also. Did anybody get a recruitment contract yet on the Entrepreneur visa or faced any problems?

2) I have an interview coming up very soon, can I show the UKBA that I have missed those contracts as that is like business lost?

I was misguided by my lawyer, actually he has charged me without any knowledge about this tier and this forum has become my last resort, pls Help.

Thanks,

Hays wouldn't accept t1 enterprenur for contractors thru them