[Paul H Coulthard]

Hi fellow members In the next couple of weeks I'm taking on a worker for 1 day a week. I'm currently self employed all fully insured  ect what do I need to do before he starts thanks in advance for info

[COLIN BRIGHT]

make sure that your insurance covers anyone who works for you, i had my Dad working for me about 10 years ago,  and when i told the insurance company the premiums almost double.....i was told that it would cover up to 10 employees but i said my dad only worked 1 day week but that made no difference. it still cost the same

[Paul H Coulthard]

Il email them see what they say insurance wise

[Ian Harper]

Paul

The easy way around this and keeps your costs low is getting them to sign a self employment contact saying they are reasonable for their own tax and nat insurance. The car valet world has been doing this for year. I worked for a company as a manager turning over 10 million and they had all staff on these contacts. also each staff member pays you the extra for any insurance increase you have to have.  This can be expensive for staff if its only one person but you you have many  staff members its cheaper for them and you know you have the right cover for each person, leaving it to them and you will be at risk. You can even go as far as charging them for use of equipment and materials. lets not forget that everyone has a tax allowance and can claim for expenses. So say they earn £100 a day you charge them Insurance for that day and use of equipment and materials. they still walk away with a good days wage with no investment costs in equipping or providing that days work, thats a win win. A car valetor has to turn up for work he might earn £60 a day or nothing. thousands of people go to work each day not know if they will earn anything so dont feel you have to be some kind of out dated model of a employer

I can say this way is safe as when I had my maid service its the way we did it and we had one person that did not tell us they where signing on. they got caught and when DHSS got in contact with us we showed them the contact and what we had paid then and the DHSS where fine with us.

One reason the UK is such a great place for big companies to come to is our employment and tax laws they are flexible and its easy to close down operations when needed unlike some other countries. zero hour contacts have been bad for people that have had to sign them but good for companies and the UK employment.

[fenman]

Unless they are already a carpet cleaner with their own van, equipment, chemicals, insurance etc and you are effectively subbing work to them   they cannot be classed as self employed and any  " self employed contract " they sign would be irrelevant to HMRC.
HMRC will always look to you to pay the tax and NI owed by you and them if you are caught treating an employee as self employed when they clearly are not.
The DSS will only be interested in what you paid them, not what you consider to be their employment status.
The only way is to directly employ them whether on zero hours is up to you.
If you need guidance speak to HMRC,  who are very helpfull.

[Hilton]

Agreed, just take them on directly employed it's only one day a week they probably wont earn enough to qualify for tax or (your choice) ensure that they don't.

If you want to buy them a drink at the end of the day for all the extra effort they put in, out of your own pocket, you are perfectly entitled to do so.

[Steve Chapman]

The actual criteria is they can work for you self employed if they have a business in their own right and work for several people and not you exclusively, if they just work for you full time then you must employ them......