Freelance Work

What Is Freelance Work?

Freelance work is work done by a freelancer, a person who works under no contract and signs onto jobs when clients are interested in their services. Freelance work could involve camera-work, sound-engineering and voice-acting.

What are the Differences between Freelance Work and Permanent Employment?

Freelance work involves no permanent contract, this means little to no job security, very flexible hours and no pensions schemes or sick pay. Whereas contracted workers will come into work during scheduled hours, the freelance-workers only operate when clients require their services. A freelancer’s employment status depends heavily on whether or not clients are coming in.

What are the Positives of Freelancing?

Freelancing is beneficial because the hours are profoundly flexible and built around the employee, whom is of course self-employed. Freelancing also provides an opportunity for ones work to be more authentic, due to the fact that the project will have mostly, the input of the freelance worker who works to a standard that they themselves set. Freelancing also provides an excellent opportunity for the freelance worker to have a well-built portfolio, as all of the work listed would be an excellent representation of the ability of the freelancer.

What are the Negatives of Freelancing?

There are downsides to freelancing, due to no coverage by permanent contract, aspects of life such as sick pay, pension schemes and tax handling can be compromised. This of course is a major negative and is a problem in the industry as freelancers can find themselves in difficult positions once they have retired, as no contracted schemes would have had them insured. Freelancers also rely on contracted work to receive their income, if there is no demand, then they shall not receive any financial income and this can be a massive problem. In order to be a financially stable freelancer, the freelancer will need to have a lot of demand and be successful in competing with other services. If this is not the case, then freelancers will be in very difficult positions not just regarding their careers, but in life too.

The ScreenSkills Freelance Toolkit

The ScreenSkills Overview of Freelancing

The ScreenSkills Freelance Toolkit on the ScreenSkills website, provides substantial insight into the world of freelancing and what sets freelancers apart from staff. According to ScreenSkills, freelancing is extremely common in the film and TV industry, with around 28% of workers in screen industries being freelancers. Overall, in production, roughly half of all workers are freelancers. It seems that in spite of less than convincing welfare-schemes, freelancing can indeed be very rewarding and provides an unmatched sense of autonomy in one’s field of work. If handled correctly and done to a good standard, freelancing can make for an excellent career in one’s field.

The Core Skills required in Freelancing

Skills in freelancing are divided into three core parts, those being technical, behavioural and other skills. To give a brief overview;

Technical skills are those bespoke to the line of work you are interested in and how good you are at carrying out tasks regarding your interest, whether it be camerawork, VFX, directing and/or others.

Behavioural skills are broadly speaking, one’s ability when it comes to interpersonal and communicative skills, how good an individual is at working with others, problem-solving, applying knowledge and expertise to help others, general social skills and being a pleasant presence all amount to how good a person’s behavioural skills are. Behavioural skills are very useful when it comes to building a good relationship with your colleagues.

An individual’s other skills involves knowledge an individual might have and hobbies they might have. Other skills are also transferrable into behavioural skills, as they deepen your character and will almost certainly make you appear a more capable, interesting and professional individual who has not just stumbled into their line of work by mistake. These skills convey excellent competence.

The Different Types of Freelancers

According to HMRC, there are four different types of freelancers;

Sole Traders – Sole traders work for themselves and compose their own invoices. Sole traders complete a self-assessment tax return at the end of the financial year, as their taxes are not covered by any schemes or companies. Sole traders are payed inclusive of income tax and national insurance and sole traders are responsible for registering themselves as self-employed with HMRC.

PAYE Fixed Term Contract – These types of freelancers have income tax and national insurance taken care of by their employer and handle the freelancer’s payroll on a specific date. Most of the time, these are the conditions for such a freelance contract.

Sole Trader and PAYE Fixed Term Contract Combination – Tax returns are calculated for you, which due to being a sole trader, shall be payed annually. Tax and national insurance shall be payed up front, which will be owed from sole trader work.

Limited Company – Certain freelancers can start their own limited business, which is essentially sole-trading, but done through one’s own limited company. This is more complex, and requires input from an accountant, not to mention beneficial professional guidance. Whether or not going down this route is right for the freelancer, wholly depends on circumstance and situation.

Marketing

Seeing as freelancers are paid for the job and constantly need to be requested to do a job, good marketing is vital to getting yourself out there and promoting yourself. Painting yourself out in a good light can be done by having a professional email address which is easy to access should you need to be contacted by a potential client. It is recommended that in order to make the best online impression possible, you should brand yourself in a professional and fashionable way. A good portfolio, website and social media presence will take a freelancer far in the world of marketing.

Management

Good time management is very important for a freelancer, making time for clients and your own life requires methodical planning. In order to avoid burnout and keep to a reasonable and healthy schedule, planning should be regularly undertaken to ensure that freelancing remains something that the freelancer enjoys rather than resents due to the lack of time they are able to put aside for themselves, due to poor time management.