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squarepusher

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  1. squarepusher
    You're correct the rates are low, its mainly due to oversupply. The contract rates here in Sydney are not much better than permanent rates, once you factor in Super, Holiday and Sick , then there is no real incentive to contract. Occasionally good rates are paid for extremely scarce skills, but this is rare and much lower than the UK rate. If you're coming here expecting UK rates, i'm afraid you'll be very disappointed.
  2. squarepusher
    Hi, I'm afraid i'll have to disagree with the above comments . The start of new financial year in Australa is not a good time to hunt for jobs. Contry to what you'd expect, Australian businesses tend to refer their project spend to the start of the new year. I'm a full stack developer, hands on team lead and Agile coach trained by thoughtworks. I have 10 years of successful London financial contracts, 22 year of experience in total and have run, owned and sold my own startups. like the poster above, I assumed that project spend would synchronise with the new financial year as in the UK. My wife and I arrived in June 2014, having left a very lucrative insurance contract in London. Generally speaking my interview success rate is 95%+ , but I found the market in Sydney virtually dead. I got interviews, received offers but these were way below my expectations and experience level. I networked with various recruitments companies (Most of the good agents are British) and soon discovered that the busiest time of the year starts pre-christams leading into January and accellerates post Australia day. The market then cools heading towards March. I'd verify this yourself. Get in touch with companies such as the Hydrogen group or TRA global, speak to the agents, they'll confirm what i'm saying. If you'd like some introductions PM me and i'll hook you up with some contacts. Good Luck with your plans Paul
  3. squarepusher
    The contract salary rates are the same in Sydney. You'd be on a good contract rate at $700-750 in finance. I use to earn £650 a day in central London as a .Net team lead in the financial sector. Once I arrived here, with the tight tax laws and low (comparative) contract rates, I chose to go permanent...
  4. squarepusher
    We wanted to move away from London due to the overcrowding, violence, filth and general unpleasant side that you only see if you live there. Other careers seem to at least pay the equivalent rate in Australia, for example a senior nurse in the UK on £45K can expect to make $95-100k in oz. On that principle and having spoken to a number of contractors who'd worked in OZ , my daily rate translation of $1100.00 per day seemed achievable. The point I was making is that if you're in IT in London, don't for one minute believe that the rates in OZ are comparable. Essentially the rate i've taken , with "Australia largest bank" is half what i'd normally earn , its the same rate I was earning in 2006. With the price of houses in sydney starting at $1.2 million for a two bedroom flat in a "Nice Area", a sub 200K salary isn't going to cut it. As for skills sets, I'm a senior full stack microsoft and open source web developer with multi-million pound mobile and ecommerce projects in my portfolio , extensive banking and finance skills and a bleeding edge skillset(webapi, Angular.js, WPF, oracle, TDD and agile) as well DevOPs, team lead, managerial and business operational change experience over the last 16 years. The other issue is that my wife, a senior blood transfusion scientist with two degrees, a masters degree in haematology and 10 years experience at one of London's busiest hospitals, is unable to find work in NSW due to a recruitment freeze. in order to apply for NSW health jobs you need to already work for NSW health .... On the plus side it is nice and sunny here
  5. squarepusher
    I arrived in Sydney in June 2014 on a PR visa , my background is in the London insurance and Banking sector as a contractor. We left london with a fair amount of savings, around £60K for me and the wife. In London I was on rates of £550-650 per day, so we were doing very well. I didn't look for work before arriving as being a contractor the jobs tend to need you there and then. After getting here we spent about six weeks settling in , so I've only started looking seriously for work this week. Before arriving I spoke to many other contractors , English and Australian, who'd worked out here. I was told to expect rates of $850+ a day or more as a minimum for my skills. Unfortunately the reality is not as expected. The are very few jobs currently and although i'm getting offered interviews for everything I apply for, the rates are very low. Even with a cutting edge development skillset i'm only getting offered $700 a day, and thats an absolute maximum. I'm slightly worried as I would have expected a similar IT market to the UK , but in reality its extreme slow and the rates are very low. If im lucky I might achieve half my UK salary here. Whats even more upsetting as I keep recieving calls from UK agents offering me very lucrative roles back in the UK.
  6. squarepusher
    I've been using http://www.streetadvisor.com.au/ to research areas to live as well as http://www.cityhobo.com/
  7. squarepusher
    Hi, Well I have finally received my PR 100 visa in February , so now i need to find a job. I'm a hands-on contract .Net Team Lead with 20 years experience. My recent gig highlights include Hiscox Insurance, EMI, ASOS, Dollar financial, LLoyds of London, SwiftCover and Money Supermarket. I've also done a lot of work with consultancies such as ThoughtWorks and RadTag. I specialise in agile transformation, team mentoring, TDD, BDD and continuous build & delivery (Teamcity, cruise control, Msbuild). My technology of choice is C# with ASP.NET MVC but i'm extremely flexible and have worked with most major technologies. Any recommendations for agencies in the Sydney area would be greatly appreciated , especially those working in Insurance , Finance or with BIG retail clients. Cheers Square
  8. squarepusher
    Year 2009 Lotus - Evora - 3.5 V6 2+2 Sport Pack + Tech Pack Petro 275 BHP 6sp manual 15000 miles Aircon uk value £32,000 Red book Value $79,000 Destination Sydney NSW Is this worth shipping with the luxury vehicle tax ?
  9. squarepusher
    Thanks for your input Alan
  10. squarepusher
    Next week I'm going to sit down with an Australian / UK tax specialist . We're going to go through all the scenarios from being a Sole Trader to off shoring . Ken , You seem very supportive of the sole trader model , so It must have genuine merit (Although i've personally never met a Sole Trader IT contractor in 20 years) . I've taken your points and will discuss them in the meeting. I think our difference of opinions may be due to our business models . I have no cost to cover apart from travel , marketing and technical equipment . The product of my output is software, mainly financial . I don't require anything apart from a laptop to do my Job and have never needed a loan or given a personal financial guarantee. My limited company also protects my liability. Should , god forbid, one of my systems fail critically the cost could be 10's of millions. So in a sole trader scenario that could potentially cost me everything. I guess I'll need some water tight insurance cover in that instance. I'll feed back my findings and write up comparison between the ways of trading for others on the forum.
  11. squarepusher
    In the UK the extra money i make through my limited company stays in the business. The purpose it serves is to provide capital. I can invest this in property, financial vehicles and other startup businesses. I personally pay no Income tax and draw only a very basic dividend based salary. The trade off for this extra capital is that i give up sick pay , holiday pay, company training, promotion and waive my legal employment rights. My contracts can be terminated instantly if i fail to deliver, or the client wishes to save costs. I only earn if i'm good at my job, so i have to constantly stay at the top of profession.. Thank you for your input Ken, but i'm struggling to see how free lancers can ever survive/ exist in the Australian economy. Without financial incentives and extremely high taxes, why would you select the self employed option ? If I was a sole trader i'd be taking all those risk mentioned previously but paying the same tax on my earnings as a permanent employee. I'd also be taking on great personal liability without the protection of a limited company or basic employment law. Why would i bother ? I'd just take a permanent role and become a "lifer" , doing 9-5 and believing that my employer owed me a living for just turning up. I'm just looking at ways to enjoy the same financial status in Australia that i've earned through hard work in sacrifice in the UK . If the is answer is "You can't" then i'll just have to accept that and work harder.
  12. squarepusher
    Thanks for input . I had a feeling I was on a hiding to nothing. I can't seem to fathom how IT contractors in Australia make their situation work. It seems that with the 80/20 test, high corporation tax and the PS test, the situation is stacked against freelancers . Combined with China and Asia on your doorstep , its amazing Australia has an IT sector at all! Here's the Summary ... "- A personal services company cannot derive more than 80% of your earnings in one tax year from one END CLIENT (regardless of the agencies involved) - Contracts should be structured as reward for results, as opposed to purely payment for time and materials. This can be qualified in terms of risk. Does your contract expose you to risk? (i.e. if your contract guarantees you payment regardless of the outcome or quality of your work, you'll fail this requirement) - Contracts should take responsibility for "rectification" of errors - Some investment in equipment or tools (i.e. not purely using the end clients resources) is required Additionally the business should meet ONE of the following criteria: * Unrelated Client: A personal services business must have multiple and unrelated clients. This negates inter company invoicing and use of investment income. * Employee Test: A personal services business must employ people to deliver the service other than the principals * Separate Business premises test : A personal services business is expected to have its own premises, not a home office or a serviced office. If you'd like more information about the 80 - 20 rule or a free assessment of whether you qualify" If you can't pass all the above , they take your company registration . So what is the contractors incentive to develop skills, work hard and take risks ? I'm currently working in the insurance sector in london , on a well paid, long term contract . I'm giving it all up to move to Australia, and i'm having massive misgivings regarding finances Tell me i'm wrong please ?? I must have missed something surely !!
  13. squarepusher
    Hi, I've been considering the options of buying a new or second hand vehicle in the UK to ship to Australia. Unfortunately I wont have owned the vehicle for a full year by the time we leave, so i'll have to pay import duty on it. The other side of the coin is that should you declare you intend to ship a newly purchased vehicle to a non EU destination , HMRC will waive the VAT. Exporting motor vehicles outside the EU - the Personal Export Scheme The Personal Export Scheme is for visitors to the UK from outside the EU, and EU residents who intend to leave the EU and remain outside it for at least six months. Under the scheme, when you buy a motor vehicle in the UK and you're going to export it, you don't have to pay VAT. When you buy a vehicle under the scheme, the supplier will give you an application form VAT 410. http://www.hmrc.gov.uk/vat/sectors/consumers/personal-vehicles.htm The question is , would i save money buying a new vehicle here , shipping it and paying Australian import duty , compared to just buying it there ? Has anyone done this ? Does anyone have any figures on the shipping costs and associated tax duties ? Thanks SquarePusher
  14. squarepusher
    Hi, I'm not really sure if this is the correct place for this , but i'll post it anyway. It's a hypothetical business scenario, i'm looking for someone who may be able to answer it ____________________________________________________________________________________________ Company A is an Australian registered PTY, Company B is a UK registered LTD. The same individual is a director and owners of both companies, but is resident in Australia. Company A secures a contract worth $250,000 dollars per annum to provide IT services in Sydney. Company A has no employees or equipment; it is effectively a service company. Company B is subcontracted to provide the employee and equipment to fulfil the contract for Company A. The employee used to fulfil the contract is the owner. Company B Invoices Company A for professional services, which account for all profits that company A will make on the engagement. Company B pays corporation TAX on profits under the UK tax system (20%). Company A pays corporation TAX and GST and to the Australian Tax system (30%) The Australian resident owner receives wages and dividend payments from company B. Company B incurs all the costs for the fulfilment of the contract (transport, equipment, and expenses) I suspect this will fall under Australian CFC legislation? I believe the UK operates a “De minimis” clause in CFC's . Companies with a turnover of less than £200,000 are exempt from CFC legislation. http://www.kpmg.co.uk/email/08Aug11/258406/Slater_Li_ForeignProfits_Acc5.pdf What are the tax implications for the owner of this scenario? Does Australia operate a similar “De minimis” clause to the UK? Would there be anyway to effectively utilise this structure to create tax efficient solution for the owner, if so what would this be? ______________________________________________________________________________________________
  15. squarepusher
    22nd February is my actual grant date . They emailed me to confirm I wasn't in Australia at the time of grant. I only exchanged one email with KP , which was to confirm my visa type .
  16. squarepusher
    Thank you , I'll look into these
  17. squarepusher
    Thank you . I have to say that the wait had been killing me . I applied to the London office with a front loaded application on 24th July 2012. KP is my CO
  18. squarepusher
    Hi, i'm looking for advice on financial scenario's. Ideally I'd like to find an dual qualified Australian/ UK accountant in London. Can anyone recommend someone ? Cheers SquarePusher
  19. squarepusher
    Finally , after 213 days , I've been informed my visa will be granted next week. It appears that the processing of July 2012 applicants has finally commenced . I look forward to exploring other parts of the forum instead of staring endlessly at this thread
  20. squarepusher
    Could someone take a look at the spreadsheet (hopefully the owner) . It looks like its been trashed.Could you roll back the version history, as many records have been deleted. https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0Aopvk3Y5mD7HdGp5V2hESFluN3V0QWNBTDg2TWJoLVE#gid=0
  21. squarepusher
    Looking at the spreadsheets, it seems highly unlikely that any grants are happening . There are 13 July applicants listed , only two of these have been granted. One was an offshore via agent and the other was a "special circumstance" . I'd hoped that the grants would have proceeded during January , but it looks as if something else is happening. Maybe there has been a cut in staff levels, perhaps there is a departmental reorganisation or maybe DIAC are running staff training ? Does anyone know what has prompted the change in the processing speed ?
  22. squarepusher
    I contacted my CO just before Christmas to confirm my visa type. My visa was lodged on 24th July , and i was politely informed (once again) not to expect it granted until March 2013 at the earliest.... Not sure what the entire DIAC office in London is doing for January / February ?
  23. squarepusher
    Hi Everyone, Congratulations to those who've received been their visa grants. I emailed KP , my CO, to obtain verification on my visa type. The good news is i'll be getting a class 100 visa :biggrin:. The bad news is that he doesn't expect to grant it until March, as originally advised. I applied in late july, so this looks like the end of the six month grant times and a definite move to the eight month time-frames. My originally CO , JC also left in October , so i'm wondering if they are cutting staff and merging their case loads ?
  24. squarepusher
    I'm thinking of ways to mitigate the 80 / 20 . So far I'm considering buying rental property though the business. You can also try expanding your services ( web sites, hosting) to increase revenue stream.
  25. squarepusher
    Hi , I had the same email today. JC will be leaving and my case officer is now KP. Slightly worried about the affect a hand over will have. Is KP completely new , or is he taking over JC's workload + his existing cases?
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