Any views on the Pimlico Plumbers case this week?

The Supreme Court ruled that because the self employed plumber  was obliged to wear company uniform ,  lease a company van with tracker,   work under very close control and do certain hours .........his status was  the same as an employed man .

This entitles him to holiday pay  etc etc  which I presume he is claiming .

in those circumstances then i would agree that he should really be employed. wonder how much he has earned being self employed compared to what he would have if he was employed?

IMHO Pimlico have been circumventing the employment laws and taxes for a long time ..........

Those guys are not self employed 

I thought IR35 was supposed to stop all this

A lot of firms are asking for SE.

Not tax,No benefits or sick pay, no pension & you get pumped at a moments notice.

Win win for Pimlico IMO.

scumbags! 

Blue Duck said:

Win win for Pimlico IMO.

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Is'nt it the opposite Ducky   ?     Won't they now have to start paying holiday pay etc     :C

It puzzled me  because , as we've discussed on here before ,  there was a time when HMRC would challenge someone's status as SE  as he only ever worked for the same firm , be it plumbing , builders  , electrical etc.   

A carpenter I work with sometimes had this some 25 yrs ago  ...so the firm took him on as an employee at the time .   

He is , today ,  actually working much the same as a Pimlico Plumber . 

Win win for many decades up til now. 

I guess? 

A mate who worked for another firm similar to Pimlico except they have yellow vans....you get paid a fair whack but out of that you are to rent the van, pay insurance, fuel, uniform, tools yadda yadda.

On top of all that you were expected to work mad hours which amounted to very little in your pocket at the end of the week. 

The government likes SE, makes employment stats look good, they can also make a lot of money taxing poor courgetteers through PAYE

Don't forget all the parasites that make money off your back: agencies, umbrellas and payroll companies milking the sweat out of you daily. 

I thought i heard Mr Pimlico say that the emplyee earnt almost £500k in his time with them.

I wonder how he would feel if HMRC back dated his taxation to that of an emplyed person, meaning he would earn less (have to give HMRC a big lump)

pewter said:

I thought i heard Mr Pimlico say that the emplyee earnt almost £500k in his time with them.

I wonder how he would feel if HMRC back dated his taxation to that of an emplyed person, meaning he would earn less (have to give HMRC a big lump)

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No sympathy for either party.

Pimlico "contractors" are all staff .............. and should be taxed that way at source, and Pimlico should be paying employers NI too

The same could be said for a lot of employers and people wonder why the treasury tax take is down......................

James OBrien, on LBC has presented the morning slot for years ........... he claims to be self employed ............. but he goes to the same place 5 days a week for about 46 weeks of the year .............

That would be "different "  Murdo   as its not the construction trade .     Nigel Farage is on LBC but I doubt he's employed by them ...he has a business as some sort of consultant  I believe . 

The construction trade is singled out for special attention ...as with CIS  for a start ...who else would put up with the nonsense of  a payment up front based on last years earnings ..." on account "  my arse .     Or the load of stuff & nonsense  where  you do a job for a high street shop say ,  a commercial firm , a farmer , a garage , a toolmaker , rewire a house  ....put your bill in and they pay you ...........................do a job in the building trade  and  the customer is obliged to deduct tax at source . 

imo if a company wants you to work for them fixed hours per week (ex any overtime) then you should be employed by them. if you work for various companies doing work as and when required then self employed

Evans Electric said:

That would be "different "  Murdo   as its not the construction trade .     Nigel Farage is on LBC but I doubt he's employed by them ...he has a business as some sort of consultant  I believe . 

The construction trade is singled out for special attention ...as with CIS  for a start ...who else would put up with the nonsense of  a payment up front based on last years earnings ..." on account "  my arse .     Or the load of stuff & nonsense  where  you do a job for a high street shop say ,  a commercial firm , a farmer , a garage , a toolmaker , rewire a house  ....put your bill in and they pay you ...........................do a job in the building trade  and  the customer is obliged to deduct tax at source . 

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Self employment and being employed rules are the same across all industries.................

CIS drives the cash payments in the trades 

What about Premier League footballers - most of them are "self employed" - my arze!

While pimlico plumbers in this case were clearly taking the piss here, I think its difficult to set a criteria that stops those taking the piss, yet doesn't catch those who are genuinely SE.

My first thought, was how about if SE workers were not allowed to have more than 75% of their yearly invoice amount to a single customer .....

but I don't think it would work, what would happen is it would be a 50% split to two customer companies who just happened to be in the same group, and what about the SE who floats between two big companies spending about 40% of time at each, and the last 20% doing little domestic bits. One of the big companies has a tough year and has to lay off the subbies, the other is doing alright and as the chap is one of their regular subbies that they trust, they give him more work in preference to some of the more occasional subbies or agency they use, so he is now doing 80% for them that year.

I'd be interested in ideas of how the line should be drawn to avoid failures either way because I think its harder than it looks at first!

Charlie Mullins is a scum rat.

I wonder how many would still think the same had they had the nouse to start such a company and benefit from the poor Hmrc rules

I had a ruling in a booklet somewhere  that  identified SE   as a worker who bids , quotes  or offers to carry out work  , supply materials and takes a financial risk  when tendering for a job .

That seemed to be the criteria .   

I'd think leasing a firm's  van , wearing a firm's uniform , tax stopped a source,  towing  a firm's line ,  the van is tracked so at the firm's beck & call ,  answering to the gaffer   ...is not really being self employed  & your own boss  is it ?   

We had subbies who came & went .    Two of them we didn't want to lose , they wanted to remain SE   , the accountant  recommended they offered to do the jobs  "On a price"  so there was a "risk" of  a 4 week job running over by 2 weeks , so they were labour only sub contractors  just the same as  the building trade .   

Another guy had his own one man alarm fitting business ,  he would phone to say he's got nothing booked in for next month , is there anything for him ?     Or we would call him if we needed a hand & he'd join us for a week .  That worked well .    

I’ll phone my ex-wife this evening to ask if there is a HMIT definition of self employed. Now she’s retired from the tax business she may help.