5 ms·

I can't see why a company couldn't have one long-term customer. It's not unusual eg. in the building sector (where large construction projects, not unlike softw

by V-2 3y ago

I can't see why a company couldn't have one long-term customer. It's not unusual eg. in the building sector (where large construction projects, not unlike software projects, can take years to complete). Another common example is MDs - quite a lot of private doctor's offices are contracted by the National Health Fund, basically providing their services for the public healthcare that way. Clearly having multiple customers isn't a reasonable requirement for a small company. Software engineering isn't like private residential plumbing - "sink drain unclogged, next please!" :) > good luck if your client decides they no longer need your services, suddenly you find out what the downside of being self employed is. That goes without saying, and the same obviously applies if you're running a "regular" company, with employees, like a restaurant or whatever. The risk is arguably even greater, as you will usually pile up some financial obligations (such as credits) and other commodities limiting your financial fluidity (remember Covid? Restaurant owners do). By the way, you can insure yourself against loss of income. Many insurance companies offer this service.

lotsofpulp 3y ago
> By the way, you can insure yourself against loss of income. Many insurance companies offer this service. In the US, I am not familiar with insurance for loss of income due to simply not being able to sell products/services. Usually, the loss of income has to be a result of covered natural disasters, vandalism, legal issues, etc. Most business insurance policies even specifically exclude pandemics, as many found out recently.
jacquesm 3y ago
> I can't see why a company couldn't have one long-term customer. Let's hope you won't find out why that's a very bad idea. > Clearly having multiple customers isn't a reasonable requirement for a small company. On the contrary, it's a must. > Software engineering isn't like private residential plumbing - "sink drain unclogged, next please!" :) That's a strawman. Sorry, but if you have just one customer and you're developing software other than taxes and your rights you are less than an employee. Don't kid yourself, that tends to lead to rude awakenings. If at the end of the year you've only sent invoices to a single customer then you are simply at risk. You need multiple customers to be stable and secure. Two is better than one and three is really the minimum. Loss of income insurance is to take care of mishaps, not to insure against market downturns or other normal risks that a business is exposed to.
- dappermanneke 3y ago
  sounds like you simply really don’t like freelancers. you know no one stops you from accumulating reserves in your company or in general, right?
  - matsemann 3y ago
    The point isn't that they doesn't like freelancers, but doesn't like how the employers misuse that to get workers without rights. "Oh, you're not employed here, so we don't have to follow labor laws, we can just terminate the contract".
    - mcv 3y ago
      If I'm not mistaken, in the US employees can also be fired just like that. Meanwhile my contract specifies a month notice for both sides. And that was their preference. I'm totally fine with being fired; that flexibility is also part of what I sell. It's why they pay me more than they pay employees.
    - dappermanneke 3y ago
      the worker rights issue is mostly a concern for blue collar workers that are forced to become freelance by some companies to save on welfare costs. that is what tax authorities actually look for when they talk about "false self-employment" and that is why it is the company giving the assignment that gets punished in these situations and usually not the freelancer. that's not really a concern for high billing consulting professionals. it is a common misunderstanding (as you can see from comments here) though and is variously used by companies to undercompensate people who could be far more profitable consulting
  - jacquesm 3y ago
    You're funny. I've been self employed for the last 30+ years and I really enjoy it. But I know the risks and I'm making sure I don't get burned because having only one customer is just setting yourself up for various kinds of failure. I love freelancers and I love freelancing. But I know the difference between being a freelancer and running a company and being an employee in all but name and you really don't ever want to be in that position.
mcv 3y ago
This is definitely a source of friction with the tax service. A couple of years ago, the Dutch tax service was trying to tackle the problem of fake self-employed people who were really just employees without the same rights, pensions, etc. The Dutch postal service PostNL was notorious for firing firing all their mail deliverers and hiring them back as self-employed people who still had to wear their uniform and work according to their schedule. And somehow the tax service approved that. But self-employed programmers who hop between big projects, negotiate their own pay (which tends to the high side) and have a lot of control over the projects they work on and the way they work on them, suddenly have to prove that they're really "zelfstandig", self-sufficient. It's frustrating. I recently went back to regular employment and I hated it. Tons of extra rules, limited vacation days, and significantly lower pay. I guess I prefer being in control, saving for my own retirement, and going on vacation as often or as little as I like. Seriously, how many vacation days I had left used to give me stress. It's significantly healthier for me to be self-employed. The way I see it: if a large company can have a single client and just rent out all their employees to that single company, why can't a small one-man company do the same? And I think I'm a lot more self-sufficient than that company; if my contract ends, I can easily get a new contract elsewhere for myself. But if their contract ends, they need to find new work for all of their employees at once, and they'll likely fire some or all of them, making the whole job security argument moot. Their risk is higher than mine, and their security isn't. I really think having lots of self-employed contractors like me is better for the industry than the overhead of having to organise into companies.
- Tade0 3y ago
  In Poland the government is in on it when it comes to specialists of any kind, as this is how they prevent people from emigrating to the west or "emigrating" (tax-wise only) to the Czech Republic, which offers a similar deal. For a while it was possible to have a flat 5% income tax rate, but I guess someone pointed out that it's too generous, so the best option now is a flat 12% and 3% healthcare contributions.

by V-2 3y ago

lotsofpulp 3y ago

> By the way, you can insure yourself against loss of income. Many insurance companies offer this service. In the US, I am not familiar with insurance for loss of income due to simply not being able to sell products/services. Usually, the loss of income has to be a result of covered natural disasters, vandalism, legal issues, etc. Most business insurance policies even specifically exclude pandemics, as many found out recently.

jacquesm 3y ago

> I can't see why a company couldn't have one long-term customer. Let's hope you won't find out why that's a very bad idea. > Clearly having multiple customers isn't a reasonable requirement for a small company. On the contrary, it's a must. > Software engineering isn't like private residential plumbing - "sink drain unclogged, next please!" :) That's a strawman. Sorry, but if you have just one customer and you're developing software other than taxes and your rights you are less than an employee. Don't kid yourself, that tends to lead to rude awakenings. If at the end of the year you've only sent invoices to a single customer then you are simply at risk. You need multiple customers to be stable and secure. Two is better than one and three is really the minimum. Loss of income insurance is to take care of mishaps, not to insure against market downturns or other normal risks that a business is exposed to.

dappermanneke 3y ago
sounds like you simply really don’t like freelancers. you know no one stops you from accumulating reserves in your company or in general, right?
- matsemann 3y ago
  The point isn't that they doesn't like freelancers, but doesn't like how the employers misuse that to get workers without rights. "Oh, you're not employed here, so we don't have to follow labor laws, we can just terminate the contract".
  - mcv 3y ago
    If I'm not mistaken, in the US employees can also be fired just like that. Meanwhile my contract specifies a month notice for both sides. And that was their preference. I'm totally fine with being fired; that flexibility is also part of what I sell. It's why they pay me more than they pay employees.
  - dappermanneke 3y ago
    the worker rights issue is mostly a concern for blue collar workers that are forced to become freelance by some companies to save on welfare costs. that is what tax authorities actually look for when they talk about "false self-employment" and that is why it is the company giving the assignment that gets punished in these situations and usually not the freelancer. that's not really a concern for high billing consulting professionals. it is a common misunderstanding (as you can see from comments here) though and is variously used by companies to undercompensate people who could be far more profitable consulting
- jacquesm 3y ago
  You're funny. I've been self employed for the last 30+ years and I really enjoy it. But I know the risks and I'm making sure I don't get burned because having only one customer is just setting yourself up for various kinds of failure. I love freelancers and I love freelancing. But I know the difference between being a freelancer and running a company and being an employee in all but name and you really don't ever want to be in that position.

mcv 3y ago

This is definitely a source of friction with the tax service. A couple of years ago, the Dutch tax service was trying to tackle the problem of fake self-employed people who were really just employees without the same rights, pensions, etc. The Dutch postal service PostNL was notorious for firing firing all their mail deliverers and hiring them back as self-employed people who still had to wear their uniform and work according to their schedule. And somehow the tax service approved that. But self-employed programmers who hop between big projects, negotiate their own pay (which tends to the high side) and have a lot of control over the projects they work on and the way they work on them, suddenly have to prove that they're really "zelfstandig", self-sufficient. It's frustrating. I recently went back to regular employment and I hated it. Tons of extra rules, limited vacation days, and significantly lower pay. I guess I prefer being in control, saving for my own retirement, and going on vacation as often or as little as I like. Seriously, how many vacation days I had left used to give me stress. It's significantly healthier for me to be self-employed. The way I see it: if a large company can have a single client and just rent out all their employees to that single company, why can't a small one-man company do the same? And I think I'm a lot more self-sufficient than that company; if my contract ends, I can easily get a new contract elsewhere for myself. But if their contract ends, they need to find new work for all of their employees at once, and they'll likely fire some or all of them, making the whole job security argument moot. Their risk is higher than mine, and their security isn't. I really think having lots of self-employed contractors like me is better for the industry than the overhead of having to organise into companies.

Tade0 3y ago
In Poland the government is in on it when it comes to specialists of any kind, as this is how they prevent people from emigrating to the west or "emigrating" (tax-wise only) to the Czech Republic, which offers a similar deal. For a while it was possible to have a flat 5% income tax rate, but I guess someone pointed out that it's too generous, so the best option now is a flat 12% and 3% healthcare contributions.