Posts by Doctor Syntax

Re: How's this supposed to work?

"So put it in your wife's name"

That would still be beneficial ownership - unless you're divorced in which case it would be ex-wife. (Or other spouse as appropriate.)

Re: How's this supposed to work?

Dammit! More, not less.

Re: IR35 idiocy

"Most Brits cannot speak another language, so Anglophone countries only, more or less. And for many people, uprooting your whole family because you have to pay tax is not going to fly as an idea."

For a spell I did a weekly commute to N Ireland. Dublin would be just as commutable.

Re: Interesting

Ministers and people who work in HMRC and make policy are familiar with the idea of getting a painter or a plumber in to do work on their house. They have no difficulty in recognising that they aren't employing such trades. They don't usually have computing contractors in to work on their houses so those are "different".

Re: How's this supposed to work?

My recollection was that it targeted individuals with less than 20% (or maybe 20% or less) shareholding in the company. Presumably that would be taken as a beneficial shareholding.

Re: How many hours a week?

"if you have two distinct employers"

If you have two employers you're employed by definition.

Re: IR35 idiocy

"but also contractors that I am amazed managed to get past the interview."

As a contractor I was amazed some of the permies got past the interview.

Re: That was nice

"GDPR is currently being revised"

Lets hope the revision makes provision for some form of pro-active enforcement. I'm thinking of something along the lines of some combination of sensitivity of data and size of the site's audience requiring an annual audit of practices.

Re: Well that ruling has a timespan of about 30 days in the UK

But what significance has an Act of Parliament compared to the opinion of an A/C who can't even distinguish between a title and the body of a comment?

Re: A less biased system

"Guess they must've been doing something right all this time."

In the past that something wouldn't have included interviewing by AI.

Any long-term very successful company can cease to be that. Think of a few two and tree letter companies in the IT world. All it takes is a change in the C suite.

Re: A less biased system

"it's not a search service, it's a nudge service."

And from time to time nudges customers elsewhere.

Psychometric testing

Hah!

I took one of those once. One of the questions was something along the lines of "Do you sometimes have feelings of panic?".

Context matters. I'm sitting in somebody's office in Cambridge taking the test. I live and work in a part of the UK with an ongoing terrorist campaign, the job I do doesn't endear me to said terrorists, my place of work has been bombed by them, I even have to go to places where I have to have an armed police or army escort. How do you compare the answer to that question with someone who works down the street from here?

Adding to that they also gave one of those IQ tests that we used to have for 11 plus when I wor a nobbut lad. The guy came back from running it through his optical reader marking machine with a puzzled look on his face saying "Have you been practising taking IQ tests?" I was probably looking equally puzzled trying to think how I might have got one wrong. It was a time when our son was just coming up to take his 11 plus but I still thought the test seemed inordinately straightforward.

Re: "In doctors, you might expect a good one to use more technical language"

"I'd expect a good doctor to tailor his speech to the needs of the patient."

Not in a job interview.

Re: Some are considering moving to another employer

"If you think it is so easy why don't you try your hand at contracting?"

Freelancer envy. It never goes away does it?

Re: It's not that hard

Is it so hard to realise that the practice was introduced to comply with tax law?

Re: It's not that hard

The reason for using limited companies is actually down to the IR as it then was. Basically if a self-employed person failed to pay tax the first company up the chain was stiffed for the default. As a result of the defaults of a few clients and agents decided, to protect themselves, they'd only deal with freelancers operating via their own companies. Were it not for that the limited company thing might never have got going.

I doubt, however, that facts make much impression when they don't coincide with your existing prejudices.

Re: Some are considering moving to another employer

"The whole point is that claim has been examined by the taxman and found to be nonsense"

The taxman has a track record of his examinations being found to be nonsense when it gets to a tribunal.

Re: Some are considering moving to another employer

This!!!

Just to explain to the benighted journo responsible: the freelancer is employed by his or her own company. What you mistakenly think of as the employer is the freelancer's company's client.

Is it even worth reading the rest of the article after an opening like this?

"this university made clear from day one"

But only on day one it would seem.

Re: Out of cheese error

"34 comments so far, and no PTerry (or comparable) references?"

Look behind you.

Re: Chip shop scuttlebutt

Or Sir Sean?

Re: Email?

No it wouldn't. I mentioned PGP. In order to help you find it here's a link to the Wonkypedia article on it: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pretty_Good_Privacy

Pay particular attention to the bit that says "Digital Signatures". Look very carefully for the bit that says National ID Scheme. You'll need to look very hard for at and there's a good reason for that.

Re: Email?

All these years decades later and we still don't have PGP with its facility for such things as electronic signatures built into email as part of the standard.

Not only would it help in situations like this if the client had an option to sign but it would also combat whale phising.

Re: "Is the cable plugged in?"

"Are BOTH ends of the cable plugged in?"

"Where are they plugged in?"