If you are self employed in the construction industry, you will be paying your own tax and national insurance. It’s quite common in the construction sector to be self employed and to work for someone else at the same time – in that you technically have a boss and work for that person or company year in, year out, but that you are responsible for doing your tax returns and making your NI contributions.
If this is the case, you should register for the CIS – a HMRC scheme that makes it easier for self employed builders to work in this way.
The Construction NVQ and Self Employment
The Construction NVQ is intended to deliver a set of skills that are:
• Easy to measure against skill levels in all different areas of the building trade
• Much wider than simply knowing how to perform the physical skills associated with your job.
So if you have a Level 2 Bricklaying NVQ, a site owner or employer knows that your overall level of competence in the job is the same as that of someone who has a Level 2 Carpentry NVQ.
Once your Construction NVQ Level is at 3 or beyond, you will have learned skills that allow you to make headway as a self-employed trades person, or even to run your own company.
The Skills You’ll Learn in the Construction NVQ
The Construction NVQ at these higher Levels teaches you how to plan jobs, put quotes together and even how to brand your business. You’ll learn about customer satisfaction and how to achieve it. You’ll learn about hiring and firing employees – the legal requirements as well as the interview skills you will need to successfully hire the right candidates.
Employing Others as a Self-Employed Construction Worker
When you run a business, rather than simply operating as a self-employed worker under the command of a company or individual, you’ll frequently need to hire employees of your own.
The hiring and firing of employees as noted above comes with legal requirements, both in terms of the rights of those individuals as employees and in terms of the health and safety obligations you have to them as an employer.
The CSCS Health and Safety Test and Your Employees
It’s important to ensure that your employees are Health and Safety qualified. Enrol them in the CSCS Health, Safety and Environment Test appropriate to their role. To prove that they have passed the Health Safety Test they’ll need to possess the CSCS Card relevant to their position too. CSCS Cards are linked by colour coding to the Construction NVQ Level that your employees have achieved: be sure you know what CSCS Card types are appropriate to their experience and position.
CSCS Cards for Your Employees
In general terms the CSCS Cards suitable for employees are most likely to be:
• The Blue CSCS Card for Skilled Workers
The Red CSCS Card for Trainees is available for workers who have enrolled in, but who have not yet achieved, the relevant Construction NVQ Level. The Blue CSCS Card for Skilled Workers is for workers who have attained a Construction NVQ Level 2.