Being a Seller

Five easy steps

Our five-step guide to setting up as self-employed for the first time.

You set your own hourly rate, which cannot be less than the current minimum wage.

We have a policy of complete price transparency – so anyone looking at the sites can see what they would pay for your services. Note that your published rate includes our industry-beating 10% management fee. Make sure you take this management fee into account when you are agreeing final rates with your Buyer.

You can also set a charity discount for charities registered with people4charity. On your homepage, you can choose the percentage by which you want to reduce your usual hourly rate, for contracts with charities.

When you offer a discount, this icon highlights your details on people4charity

Everything you need to know about invoicing and timesheets. You benefit from guaranteed payment for your contracts, and can choose our five-day Fasterpay service.

We manage all invoicing and credit chasing on your behalf, and guarantee to pay you 30 calendar days after raising the invoice.

Fasterpay brings forward payment of your invoices to within five working days. This costs a small fee – 3% of your total payment – and you select it when you agree your contract terms.

Please note: 5 working days refers to the time we pay the invoice, we cannot guarantee that you will receive your payment within 5 working days.

IR35 refers to rules introduced to ensure that long-term contractors were not avoiding payment of tax and National Insurance in situations where they were, in effect, employees rather than contractors. The rules can apply to sole traders and to those operating through their own limited company.

On this page, we look at its implications for freelancers and contractors.

Information for you, if you are trading as a limited company.

If you’re new to contracting, or thinking about going freelance, there’s advice from Lisa Keeble of Contractor Umbrella, an umbrella company.

The importance of ratings and when you can give and receive them.

You get ratings from Buyers for your people4business contracts.

You can also contact previous employers to provide retrospective ratings to enhance your people4business listing.

There’s a special offer on membership of the Profesional Contractors’ Group (PCG) for people4 Sellers.

There’s also information for when you are trading as a sole trader

To comply with employment and tax legislation, all Sellers currently need to be paid through a limited company.

This can be your own limited company, or an umbrella company, which will manage payments on your behalf, deducting tax and national insurance.

If you are a sole trader, setting up an account with an umbrella company is quick and straightforward and can make handling your finances far easier; as well as helping you to comply with IR35 tax regulations.

Benefit from more space for your description, and top listing in Buyer searches.

Subscribers get top position in all Buyer searches and a more prominent entry, with twice as much space for your ‘brief description’.

Subscription is currently £50.00 plus VAT for six months, £75.00 plus VAT for a year.

If you are a sole trader, you will need to be registered with an umbrella company, so that we can be sure you are meeting your tax obligations.