echohelloworld; now a company.

Business is hard. I've enjoyed working for other companies as it allows me a level of separation from things like tax, legal issues and insurance so that I can concentrate on doing what I do best. Considering the current climate, job hunting has become very competitive, especially where PHP is concerned - you can get a lite version of my skillset for so much less than I'm willing to work for, that not even I'd employ me right now! This, and many other things, has lead me to take the plunge and start my own company consulting and developing applications (purposefully avoiding using the word "solutions") for people who are serious about the web. <!--more--> I'm in very early stages right now (read: not even incorporated yet), but it's been such an experience, I thought I'd share what I've done so far.

The main issue I've really had was deciding whether I wanted to be a limited company or a sole trader. There are benefits to both - on the sole trader hand, you have less admin, less legal and financial hoops to jump through (IR35, anyone!?) and it's generally a brief bit of contact with the IR and you're off. On the limited hand, you have better tax breaks and limited liability (this turns out to be more important than I'd first thought) in a nutshell.

Ultimately, I decided (after being so close to going sole trader) that I wanted to be a limited company, and I'll tell you why. The only thing (initially) stopping me from being a limited company was the paperwork. Tax and the law scares me, and I wanted to be as free from it as possible.

It turns out, there are these guys called accountants and they do so much more than I thought they did. If you give them some money, they'll set up your company for you so that you're totally ready to go. You then go to the bank and open a bank account for your company, get some insurance and plan how you're going to make sure the Inland Revenue know that you're your own entity (this is all before you even have any work, unless you're like me and already have some!). Then, periodically (not at that stage yet), you send this nice man your receipts and invoices and he figures out how much tax you have to pay and how much you can claim back, and seeing as his fee is something you can claim VAT back on, I've been told that I could potentially find him paying for himself in VAT claimback if I have enough expenses. If not, my overheads are small enough that he's one of them. Win win.

With regard to IR35, your independence is very important. If you could be misconstrued as an employee of another company, it could cost you a lot. This is one of those things that I don't really know a lot about, so my lovely accountant was kind enough to tell me that you basically have to fluff up your feathers, be all professional and contemptuous toward the fact that you would ever work for someone else. Being a freelancer, this could sometimes be a difficult differentiation to make, so I'm hoping to check boxes by getting some qualifications (finally, an excuse to do my ZCE, wonder what the Python equivalent is...anyone?), getting insured, getting terms and conditions and getting started.

Although this is a totally scary time of my life, I have made some amazing contacts who have been really supportive of my relative naïvety and I feel like I'm going to do very well. After all, I love what I do and now I get to be my own boss - who wouldn't love that? Next exciting part (aside from starting work tomorrow!) is getting my stationary designed. I wasn't a fan of it initially - I don't like printing, and I don't really work in that way (I'd prefer to email vcards than give out a business card) but I know that I'm in the minority there, so biting the bullet I am.

Sadly, this has been a meandering and ultimately pointless post, but I feel this is an occasion that needs to be marked, so help me mark it and wish me luck!