MJH

If you are considering being an employer, rather than taking on a self employed arborist, then it does involve working out their tax and national insurance each month/week (however frequently you choose to pay them) and seeing to it on their behalf. As a small employer, you can download BASIC Paytool for free off the HMRC website and it does the maths for you. More info about how to register and become an employer at HM Revenue & Customs: New employer - getting started

Thanks for the advice. So if you get the bona fide subcontractors to price the work, do they then write up the job description and price and give it to you, and you add your cut and sent the quote off? What would be a reasonable cut on top? Thanks

Hi Tim Tree. We have to do it this way due to being a very small business (only two arborists) and me in the office. Our main man is undergoing medical surgery and will be off for at least 3 months. He won't be up to overseeing a new team or labour only subbies whilst recuperating (Doctors orders). However, we do have work coming in so the only option I can see is to sub it out to bona fide contractors. I would be genuinely interested to know the reason for your reservations.

Hi Paul Thanks for the link. The attached forms will definately be of use. Still have a few questions, as I said in my first post, especially with regards to pricing and finding reputable bona fide contractors. Will be really grateful for any more advice from those in the know. Thanks guys.

Hi there We are a small family business serving mainly domestic customers. Due to high volume of work and also ill health we are looking into contracting out a bit of work to bona fide sub contractors. I have looked into this a bit and as I understand it bona fide subcontractors need to have their own vehicles and equipment and public liability insurance to at least match ours. We give them the work and they carry it out on their own time using all their own equipment. This is as opposed to a subcontractor who works along side us and is covered by our insurance on the day they work with us. Due to lack of experience in this field I would really appreciate some help with the following: * anyone know of a template agreement to draw up with bona fide contractors * how best to go about finding bona fide contractors who will uphold our reputation of carrying out top quality tree work * How are prices with bona fide contractors usually worked out *Any other advice would be much appreciated. Many thanks in advance.