RACS have been providing contractors with an umbrella solution since April 2007; previously to this they were known by a different name and rebranded when the current legislations were introduced. They are able to boast several accreditations to give their members peace of mind. The RACS website is very nice indeed, it is user friendly and full of information and downloads.

Our experience

When you call into RACS your call will be handled by an automated answering machine that will direct you to the appropriate department. The staff member that we spoke to at RACS was extremely helpful, full of knowledge and very professional. When you use the RACS Collective umbrella service you will be charged £5.00 per day worked, so if you work 5 days each week your fee will be £25.00 per week. There is no separate monthly fee and no hidden charges at all and if you do not work you will not be charged.

Expenses can be offset and RACS have a dispensation that will allow you to claim £5.25 per day for meals, if you work within a major city. umbrelladetective.com was told that there is no need for a receipt when your meal claims fall  within this allowance. You can claim business expenses for travel and other genuinely incurred costs but will be required to send the original receipts in to RACS. You will not be able to claim your expenses online but they can be administered by email and post.

RACS asked us if our contract was IR35 friendly and the length of our contract to determine whether our workplace could be classed as a temporary one. Once they were satisfied that it could be, they gave us a personal illustration by telephone and offered to email this to us as well. The illustration that you will be given by RACS includes all fees deducted so is a true take home pay figure. We were very happy with the way in which the representative from RACS performed, we asked many questions and received knowledgeable, descriptive answers that were easy to understand.

When you become employed by RACS your holiday pay will be held back at 12.07% of your gross income and this can be requested to be paid out when you require it. You will also be entitled to Statutory Sick Pay (SSP) at the standard rates and will be covered by their business insurances. With compliance being key to so many contractors and agencies in the industry, RACS will not disappoint as they are accredited by Professional Passport and AEMC ensuring they have done as much as possible to give peace of mind to their customers and business partners.

Overall umbrelladetective.com found RACS to be excellent in all areas, we asked them a lot of questions to which they provided very good answers. They gave us a personal illustration and explained their services in clear simple terms that new comers to the umbrella industry will understand. We received the email from RACS within 10 minutes and it contained the illustration we were given by phone as well as a lot more information that we found very useful. umbrelladetective.com are sure that the services you will receive at RACS will be of the highest possible standard.