I might have the chance to head of down the self employment route. The work on offer would be a long term agreement for two days a week (home working and site visits – no office/equipment provided etc). I can then look for another couple of days a week or share parental duties with the wife while she returns to work part time.

I need to start researching the ins and outs of tax, accounting costs and other costs in Scotland. Is the business gateway the right people to speak to? Are there any other reliable sources of information out there or should I just bite the bullet and meet with an accountant?

Find a couple of basic books (I got the Which? guide to small business) and find a small decent accountant. If you’re near Glasgow, I can’t recommend mine enough.

The Business Gateway / Enterprise / whatever they’re called this week people are useless. They’re there to justify themselves, so they can tick you off on a box as another business they’ve helped start up, so they can get more funding to continue. I was totally unimpressed with them.

The system may be different in Scotland but my local job centre got me an appointment with the local: ‘new business enterprise’ who provided accountant services fur the first few months which was a massive help. The job centre also gave me JSA for a few months while I set up, provided I looked for other work and my self employment met their criteria. It was great and I have been trading for 18 months now.

My experience with the enterprise seems different from that above, my friend said they were shit too so it seems to vary on your area/luck.

The which book is good.

Good luck and I hope it works out for you.

no pension
no sick pay
no employee benefits
pay your own national insurance and income tax.
Naaaahhhh

But no boss 😉

The hmrc .gov website has a lot of useful information including examples of what you can and can’t do. Setting up is easy if you just want to be a sole trader. I think there is some reason why quitting then just working for the same employer as self employed is not good but I didn’t do that so can’t remember why.

As jekkyl says you will lose a some benefits so make sure you get more pay to cover the difference. There are more than enough other benefits of being self employed to make it worth while, though.

Thanks all. I get very few benefits at the minute as I’m a project worker, sick pay is the only perk and I’m lucky if that’s two days a year. I wouldn’t be working for the same employer so there’s no issue there.

I’m up in the NE so best look for a local accountant but thanks for the offer.

Looks like I’ll have some reading to do over the weekend and a look at some online bookshops.

If my wife heads down a similar route are we best as two sole traders or a single entity? One for the accountants I guess.