Driver hire umbrella ****stay away****

UK PROFESSIONAL DRIVERS FORUMS THE UK PROFESSIONAL DRIVERS FORUM (INTERACTIVE)
1

I’ve been registered with Driver Hire agency for over 6 months now with no quarrels. They’ve always looked after me by giving me almost a full weeks work every time and all the time, and when i needed time off they paid me for days off too.

Today though i got a call from a new division of Driver Hire called Driver Hire Umbrella. They basically rang me up to tell me that because of my Branch’s overheads they have to move the highly paid drivers to the new umbrella division, which is a new contract and terms and conditions. The thing was they were talking to me like i already agreed to it and am happy to sign up. So, i told them to hold up and go through what the Umbrella division is about and why i should change my current agreement. I was very surprised to what i heard next…

The young lady passed me on to someone that supposedly knows more and he started to explain that now i’ll be getting paid for my holidays from my current hourly rate. So any future holidays i take i won’t be getting paid for that day off as i have already been paid for it in my hourly rate. Bearing in mind that my hourly rate wasn’t going to go up to cover this, it would stay at the same rate it has been for months. when i explained to him that i would be losing out this way he started to explain that the other option is to have a set amount taken off my hourly rate to cover my holidays in the future. at this point i got angry cause this is a complete rip off.

At the moment i’m entitled to holidays pro-rata. So according to how many hours i worked during the last 12 weeks and at what rate. they would take the average over that period and pay my holiday according to that. This is based on work you have already done with the agency. Now they’re new system they’re trying to implement is basically charging me for taking time off. So, i other words i’m paying for my own holidays/time off. In other words they’re trying to worm their way out of paying holidays which is an entitlement by law.

After hearing this i told me before you go any further i don’t want to join your scheme and i’m happy as i am, and don’t call me again. They try to tell you you’ll be better off cause you can offset your travel/food expenses from your tax which is right but you don’t need to pay them to do that for you you can actually do it yourself and do a self assessment at the end of the year and include your travel expenses to and from your place of work (the place you’re contract is taking place that day) and make sure you keep all your receipts in case you get asked. You can find out more by reading more about the rates etc. from the following link driverhire.co.uk/Local%20Off … ast%20(067/DH%20Umbrella%20Expenses%20Form.pdf also google umbrella to learn more about it.

On top of all this they charge you as well a percentage off your wages for doing all this for you. So all i would say is ask a lot of questions and make sure you are not falling prey to these vulchers who would rather prey on us drivers that barely make ends meet than prey on the companies that have all the money.

I hope this helped somewhat and good luck.

2

They get 10 out of 10 for trying, wonder if the person you spoke to pays for his own company holidays! Good on you for standing up for yourself but what’s the betting they won’t have as much work on next week.

3

Fraid to say I’m on this scheme. Not sure what to do as they didn’t offer me PAYE without a fight and the only other choice is NOVA or LTD company. Something I know nothing about.

4

The deals like this sound good to those addicted to full time hours. Because of your track record of “flat out week after week” working, they clearly think you a good “mark” to try their conning spiel on.

Under PAYE you build up gradual holiday, albeit in the form of a holiday pot. NO “averages” that peter down when you take time off. Just a set amount 12.07% paid into a pot on top of your regular hourly rate on PAYE.

To say some way into this that you have suddenly LOST that built-up holiday, or you have to take a pay cut to “pay for what’s already yours” is THEFT if you do not willingly sign up to the new bull contract.
You’ve said you’ve not done that - good for you!

Therefore what they are now attempting is blatent theft, breach of contract, and I’m sure HMRC would dimly view the firm as culpable to “false accounting” as well.

Alas, they will probably threaten you with “no sign up - no work - banned for life” - but if you DO sign, then you are “in on the con” and have no comeback after, plus HMRC might one day land you with a huge bill, and also any unpaid taxes/NICs that have been palmed away by the umbrella firm, as often happens.

The only way to deal with this, is resign, use the small claims court to get any wages & outstanding holiday pay you’ve probably got stolen from you by this point, and get signed up with a reputable agency nearby that won’t thieve like this one wants to.

Might I suggest you look to the areas of Uckfield, Tunbridge Wells, East Grinstead, and even Gatwick - which is where there’s plenty of work, albeit outside of Eastbourne proper.
Don’t bother with Brighton & Lewes - it’s all handball/multidrop around there as far as I can tell.
Hastings is a funny kettle of fish with loads of bitty work, if that’s your thing, but I am to understand you would like to continue on “flat out” jobs if possible…

My experience of Driver Hire Umbrella was Dartford (DHL) for the sainburys depot there. :imp: I wasted a day there, and walked away when told the full bull. :angry:

5

I had to use ACAS earlier this year after all the spiel they came out with. They started to pay minimum wage, and said that I could top up my wages with the mileage allowance and daily meal allowance.id said initially I didn’t want to opt in, and they had said I was automatically in it as it was now a directive from hmrc, which i said was a crock of ■■■■ and I hadn’t returned any of the paperwork they repeatedly had called for me to sign and return.
After bringing myself upto date with a few basic hmrc legislation and employment law I could then talk on their level.
The conversation went something along the lines of
Agent - well don’t you want to pay less tax?
Me if I’d wanted minimum wage I’d av gone to work at the shop next door to my house?
Agent yes but this way u get the benefits of mileage and daily meal allowance, don’t you want to pay less tax?
Me - no I don’t want to pay less tax, in fact I’d much rather have a 100k salary and pay a bucket load of tax than earn minimum wage jus so I can have the honour of saying I’m a tax dodger.
Agent- well this way u pay less tax?
Me- so are you wanting to give up your 25k ish salary and earn minimum wage just so u only pay tenner a week cash
Silence
So in the end ACAS did sort it all, thankfully I was on holiday when I discovered their sly dog work so had only worked one week on dogshat money and didn’t return.
W ankers

6

Is it actually possible to walk into an agency and flatly refuse everything except PAYE?

7

yes it is, said this lots of times before if asked my opinion on ltd/umbrella/paye i will give my persoanl views/opinions on it (as they all do have pros and cons) however i am not financially trained so unable to give accurate advice and will tell the driver to take advice before going umbrella/ltd.

no agency can force you to go ltd./umbrella and if they did would you really want to work for them?

sounds to me like dh are trying to penny pinch - the standard is normally £1 increase an hour.

8

Yes.

I’ve just got back from an FTA conference where 70% of the bosses present said it was ‘difficult’ or ‘very difficult’ to recruit drivers and they ALL said they were looking to recruit divers in the coming year. An that was in South Wales…hardly the economic powerhouse of the UK.

So you should be telling the agencies:

  1. What your hourly rate is

  2. How long you expect them to engage you for

  3. How you expect to be paid: either PAYE (with holidays, sick pay and other benefits) or self-employed at a premium rate so you can cover your own holiday, sick pay etc (and you don’t need to be a Ltd Co). Do not enter into an umbrella scheme…most of them are illegal.

9

Mattwoodtransport:
I had to use ACAS earlier this year after all the spiel they came out with. They started to pay minimum wage, and said that I could top up my wages with the mileage allowance and daily meal allowance.id said initially I didn’t want to opt in, and they had said I was automatically in it as it was now a directive from hmrc, which i said was a crock of [zb] and I hadn’t returned any of the paperwork they repeatedly had called for me to sign and return.
After bringing myself upto date with a few basic hmrc legislation and employment law I could then talk on their level.
The conversation went something along the lines of
Agent - well don’t you want to pay less tax?
Me if I’d wanted minimum wage I’d av gone to work at the shop next door to my house?
Agent yes but this way u get the benefits of mileage and daily meal allowance, don’t you want to pay less tax?
Me - no I don’t want to pay less tax, in fact I’d much rather have a 100k salary and pay a bucket load of tax than earn minimum wage jus so I can have the honour of saying I’m a tax dodger.
Agent- well this way u pay less tax?
Me- so are you wanting to give up your 25k ish salary and earn minimum wage just so u only pay tenner a week cash
Silence
So in the end ACAS did sort it all, thankfully I was on holiday when I discovered their sly dog work so had only worked one week on dogshat money and didn’t return.
W ankers

:laughing: :laughing: :laughing: :laughing: :laughing:
+1 there

  • straight out of the “Winseer’s Bible for ex-tory voters”! :smiley: :smiley:
10

i wonder if the ‘people’ giving this advice are financilly trained? or whether they would be breaking the law in tha respect?

winseer over to you!

11

ezydriver:
Is it actually possible to walk into an agency and flatly refuse everything except PAYE?

Yes…but at my place ,they kept asking me to go on,until they got it ‘explained’,why…and my reason was …‘i aint going on umbrella,cos they are all thieving pond -scum ,leeching parasites’.Never been asked since

12

I think all agencies are a united group and so all work ( or most do ) to the same stipulations, and I also believe that when the government said that agencies had to pay holiday pay, the same as a company employing full time drivers, they all got around the table to see how they could wriggle out of paying, and came up with the idea of making drivers pay for their own holidays, and forming umbrella companies to deal with PAYE and Tax deductions, and then said a driver will have to pay for this, very clever, but I am glad to see drivers fighting back, and so when approaching an agency just tell them you want paying x amount and that it is their job to deduct monies owed to the government, without penalising the drivers by charging them for this service, and that should all be within the confines of the rates being offered.

13

truckyboy:
I think all agencies are a united group and so all work ( or most do ) to the same stipulations, and I also believe that when the government said that agencies had to pay holiday pay, the same as a company employing full time drivers, they all got around the table to see how they could wriggle out of paying, and came up with the idea of making drivers pay for their own holidays, and forming umbrella companies to deal with PAYE and Tax deductions, and then said a driver will have to pay for this, very clever, but I am glad to see drivers fighting back, and so when approaching an agency just tell them you want paying x amount and that it is their job to deduct monies owed to the government, without penalising the drivers by charging them for this service, and that should all be within the confines of the rates being offered.

got to agree100% bob… - i recently had a blazing set-to with a certain agency who assumed it was ok to charge £60-70 plus each week ffs .,to ‘process’ my wages and then were telling me to fill in some of their bogus mileage and meal allowance paperwork in order to '‘offset’ these monies…,which would have not only implicated me in their tax fiddling but would have ensured that, come HMRC /IR35 inspection time , muggins here would be faced with a massive tax bill and/or prosecution…(not them…, as MY name and signature would have been on the paperwork)…PLUS; already had a back tax bill off HMRC from when i worked thru that shower of s##t ADR and their fiddle umbrella scheme * :smiling_imp: nightmare Umbrella = DONT TOUCH WITH A BARGEPOLE- its ALL for THEIR benefit -not yours!

14

Is it normal for DH to ring ex employees? Had a couple of phone calls off them this afternoon, one I missed the second couldn’t be arsed to answer. Just wondered if they’re getting desperate, or maybe my replacement is coming from them when I finish on the flour next Friday?

15

DriverHire is a franchise (I think!)
so not all branches are like this - I was put on PAYE when I first signed up, went on to Umbrella by request (doh), and now back on PAYE, no hassles

16

daffyd:
DriverHire is a franchise (I think!)
so not all branches are like this - I was put on PAYE when I first signed up, went on to Umbrella by request (doh), and now back on PAYE, no hassles

The Lincoln office told me I can do PAYE but its done monthly, not weekly.

17

war1974:
i wonder if the ‘people’ giving this advice are financilly trained? or whether they would be breaking the law in tha respect?

winseer over to you!

You don’t need to be “financially trained” to either spot a crooked deal, or point out a bum deal to anyone listening.

It’s a misnomer anyways… Ask anyone who flashes their “qualifications” at you how to grant a butterfly spread, offset a fungible market, or lay a CBOE VIX spike - and you’ll probably get them showing you some pamphlet that has sod all to do with anything financial at all - just some pics of people in smart suits paid for out of the huge commissions they hope you’ll lace them with.
“Financial Advice” therefore doesn’t involve “actual investments” any more than you can walk into a “Chemist” and by “Dangerous Chemicals” as one was once able to… :neutral_face:

Those that “do” have so-called “financial training” are merely taught the art of salesmanship - to improve their bare-faced lying abilities when confronted by someone like me asking all the awkward questions…

“You do want to pay less tax don’t you?”

I had aleady replied “If my tax bill for next year end is £50,000 gradually paid as PAYE - I’d be very happy with the work you’ve been giving me…” - Pretty much the same thing as “want to earn high, and pay buckets of tax”. :smiley:

“A tenner? - No thanks. I’d have to be on minimum wage, and paying to go to work to ‘only’ be paying that - or making exaggerated & illegal claims that’ll no doubt come back to bite me in the arse when HMRC catch up with you folks…”

I work for a good TOP line first, bottom line is what’s left after the missus has had most of it to stock the larder… :unamused: