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What are the best jobs for self-employment? Personal trainers, gardeners, hairdressers, private chefs, photographers, and dog walkers are examples of sole traders examined in the UK.
How can sole traders list be defined? If you’re looking for a way to earn extra income, here are six jobs that are ideal for setting up on your own, whether you’re interested in fitness training, gardening, hairdressing, private catering, photography, or even dog walking.
If you go viral, you can earn more than £60,000 a year as a personal trainer
Personal trainers are made up of what kind of people?
Fitness trainers provide individualised exercise and nutrition plans in gyms. If you want to work for yourself as a sole trader and are sporty, becoming a personal trainer can be a great option.
It is of course important to be passionate about fitness; however, many people become personal trainers as a second career or as a side hustle or because they have a supportive partner who takes the pressure off.
Fitness enthusiasts with business acumen make the best self-employed personal trainers.
Personal trainers, however, must be prepared to work long hours – starting as early as 6am, obtaining their own initial and ongoing qualifications, managing their client schedules and marketing themselves.
Yes, that’s correct. Level 2 Certificate in Gym Instruction and a Level 3 Certificate in Personal Training are the minimum requirements. In person and online certificate programs are available, as well as full-time and part-time options.It’s time to start drumming up clients once you’ve got your certificate.
In the next stage, you will take classes in nutrition and business management.
Is Forex Trading Tax Free in the UK?
“I always recommend people get their Level 3 because from there, the sky’s the limit,” says Ross Mitchell, who trains trainers for PT training company Future Fit.
Medical practitioners can refer you to you if you hold a Level 4 qualification, which enables you to work with people with medical conditions such as diabetes.
No, not necessarily. Many gym chains and some independent gyms rent gym space to freelance personal trainers, including Puregym. If you’re a freelancer taking a fitness class, gyms will pay you between £30 and £35 per class.
Mitchell recommends working in a gym to begin with. You will gain a better understanding of people as well as where you want to go as a fitness professional if you work onsite.
It’s not just about fitness when you’re a personal trainer. Getting to know your client is all about understanding their personality, their struggles. Personal trainers aren’t the only ones passionate about fitness.”
You could also offer sessions in local parks if you specialize in outdoor training. Your business won’t be visible or get clients if you go fully mobile right away. Local councils may still charge you even for offering workouts in a park.
Personal trainers can also work as self-employed professionals in the following places:
Fitness specialisations are similar to specialized surgeons, rather than general practitioners, according to Ross Mitchell.
Currently, the following specialties are in demand:
What is the cost of becoming a personal trainer?
For an intensive six-week course, the National Register of Personal Trainers estimates course fees range from £900 to £5,000. It is estimated that you will spend around £2,500 on a full Level 3 qualification as a personal trainer.
When something goes wrong during a session, specialist personal trainer business insurance can protect you from costly claims. As well as getting covered in the event of equipment loss, damage, or theft, your employees’ injuries during training, or your own.
Many gyms and sports centers require you to provide proof of specialist insurance before hiring you.
A public liability insurance policy is a necessity if you train clients. In case another person is injured or property is damaged, this covers your legal liability. If an injured client holds you responsible for their injury or a facility you’re training at is damaged by you, you may need to make a claim.
If you train clients, you need professional indemnity insurance in case they suffer an injury after following your instructions. It covers you if a claim is made against you.
The costs of physiotherapy or dental treatment could be covered by personal accident insurance if you injure yourself while training. A personal accident policy can also include optional loss of earnings coverage up to 52 weeks for financial support if your injuries render you unable to work as a result of your injuries.
Insurance for personal trainers must also cover equipment. Protect your equipment against loss, theft, and damage if you transport it between a fitness center and a client’s home. Inexperienced clients may damage your equipment during a session, for instance, if they break into your car. The repair or replacement of these things would be on your own dime if you didn’t have equipment coverage.
According to Puregym, personal trainers charge an average hourly rate of £30-£35. During your first year, you can expect to earn between £10,001 and £16,000; by year two, it will increase to between £16,000 and £20,000. They can earn anything from £25,000 to £60,000 as full-fledged trainers.
Depending on the specialist training involved, some trainers can charge up to £100 per hour. It may be worth the time and effort to coach the next Dina Asher-Smith or Katarina Johnson-Thompson, but famous athletes don’t necessarily pay you – since they consider it more valuable to be associated with your brand for other clients of relatively lower income.
Personal trainers who do not treat their profession as a business tend to have a high attrition rate, according to Ross Mitchell of Future Fit.
The situation is not like Field of Dreams, unfortunately. Building it will not attract them, he tells me. There is a lot of work involved.”
You could become the next Joe Wickes if one of your workouts goes viral.
The income of an experienced gardener can reach £70,000 per year as a result of their growing reputation
Outdoor activities are healthy, as we know. Summer is the perfect time to work outdoors in nature all day long. You can become a gardener relatively cheaply if you enjoy gardening.
In 2016, Urban Paradise’s Mark Soanes quit his job as an operational manager after 15 years with companies such as Virgin Media and Universal.
The British Academy of Garden Design gave him the chance to complete his degree in garden design after he became a keen amateur gardener.
The Royal Horticultural Society (RHS) offers courses for self-employed gardeners, so he recommends taking one.
“There’s a lot to learn about gardening,” Soanes said. Learning is a lifelong process. Everybody has to start somewhere, so you should take as many courses as you can.”
There is always the option of joining a gardening company
As a junior gardener, you can also become a self-employed gardener by joining a bigger gardening firm. Therefore, you don’t have to spend money setting it up alone, and you can observe and learn from another, more experienced gardener.
In order to set up a self-employed business as a gardener, potential self-employed gardeners should budget £7,000 to £10,000. This includes buying a van to transport tools, purchasing proper equipment, and saving for professional indemnity insurance.
How much will it cost me to set up?
You can list your services with the Gardeners Guild by registering. In addition to the £10 initial registration fee, full membership costs just £45 per year. Before being accepted for membership, however, you must have a Level 2 or higher regulated horticultural qualification.
Is there a salary I can expect?
The travel to and from jobs makes it very inefficient for professional gardeners to work in blocks of three to four hours.
There is a range of charges from £20 to £50 an hour for gardeners or a minimum of £150 a day for gardeners. Depending on how sophisticated a service you provide, this could be anything from £15,000 to £70,000 a year.
There’s always something to do in gardening and landscaping, contrary to popular belief.
Examples of sole traders: The average income for a hairdresser is around £30,000, but if you work with celebrities, you can earn far more
Having the freedom to grow into your role as a hairdresser is one of the best things about being self-employed. Working for a big city-centre salon or opening your own salon is an option you can take as a junior stylist.
For clients who wish to visit you in a salon, you can rent a chair and visit them there.
There is a college course that will teach you about hairdressing (a Level 2, Level 3 Diploma, or T-level – only available in England, from September 2023).
If you want to learn on the job, you could work your way up as a trainee hairdresser in a salon after completing a salon apprenticeship. Upon completion of your apprenticeship, you will receive a certificate from your employer. A National Vocational Qualification (NVQ) diploma can be earned at different levels of apprenticeship.
Chair rental
Having the option of visiting clients or bringing them to your home is one of the benefits of being a freelance hairdresser.
In addition to renting a chair, you can also pay the owner a percentage of the takings when you are there when you rent a chair in a salon. Around 40% is the standard percentage.
Self-employed hairdressers can buy insurance through Professional Beauty Direct starting at £42.50 per year. Insurers offer this policy to self-employed mobile hair stylists and hairdressers, either at their homes or at their clients’ homes, or renting a chair in a salon. There is a limit of £6 million in liability coverage under the policy. An additional charge can be added for equipment coverage.
In addition to liability coverage of up to £6m, the insurance package provides:
In the event that a customer is stabbed with your scissors at work or at home, your public liability insurance will cover the costs of injuries and accidents that may occur.
You need product liability insurance if you sell products after treating your clients, for example aftercare products or the products you used on them. Allergies to the product are included here.
You are covered by treatment liability insurance if a client is injured or ill as a result of your treatment
Junior hairdressers earn an average salary of £14,000 a year, while highly experienced hairdressers make £30,000 a year.
A private chef is an example of a sole trader
Private chefs earn an average salary of nearly £39,000 per year
Can you tell me what a private chef does?
Many of the contestants on Masterchef go on to become private chefs after they win the show. And many of the Masterchef professionals are already working as private chefs.
If you set up as a private chef, you may cater for single dinner parties, glamorous country house weekends, or even take on the role of an onboard cook for the rich and famous on yachts.
It is important to note though that private chefs can work up to six days a week, covering all meals from breakfast through dinner, plus washing up and wiping down, which can result in a 12-hour day in total.
After formally training at a cookery school such as Ballymaloe, Le Cordon Bleu, or Leiths, most chefs become cooks to gain experience.
Before setting up on their own, they may work their way up to sous chef in a restaurant.
Is there a salary I can expect?
Depending on the experience and location, a live-out chef can earn from £30,000 to £70,000 per year. Private chefs earn an average salary of £38,732 per year.
Photographer is an example of a sole trader
Each of us has become a photographer in some way. Instagram feeds us with pictures we take on our iPhones. Self-employment as a photographer might be an option for you if you have a good eye.
What are the requirements for becoming a freelance photographer?
Having a certificate can reassure clients, but formal qualifications are not necessary. There are a number of organizations that offer photography courses, including the British Academy of Photography and the Royal Photographic Society, among others.
Are there any equipment requirements for becoming a freelance photographer?
As a freelance photographer, how much can I earn?
A freelance photographer earns an average of £31,336 per year, according to Glassdoor. It’s estimated that the average hourly rate in the UK is £28.44 if you’re just starting out.
The Pet Food Manufacturers’ Association estimates that 3.2 million UK households have acquired pets since the pandemic began.
The PFMA estimates that there are 12 million dogs in Britain, and they all require walking. When people worked from home and appreciated a walk around the local park, walking them was fine, but it’s not so easy now that people are back at work — even for three days per week.
There’s more to it than just liking dogs, as you need to be physically fit to walk a Labrador Retriever in driving rain and mud.
You may be able to call yourself a “dog runner” if you are fit and enjoy running, and you may be able to work with high-energy breeds who like long walks when you are a dog walker.
Even if you’re a senior or disabled, you can still work as a dog walker by stating that you only handle small breeds and elderly dogs.
It might be a good idea to volunteer at a local kennel or rescue center first if you’d like to gain more experience with dogs. In order to keep small dogs from getting trampled, large dogs should be placed in the center of the pack and big dogs on the outside.
“Experience is the most important thing,” says Marilyn Lewis, support manager at NarpsUK. Make contact with a local rescue centre and learn how to put on a collar and lead and walk dogs.”
Dog walking businesses do not follow many specific rules or regulations. The professional dog walkers’ association NarpsUK advises that dogs should always be walked with the owner before walking them for the first time, that dog walkers keep records of all dogs and payments, and that customer information should always be protected.
Dog walking is one of the professional qualifications offered by City & Guilds at the Level 2 Certificate level.
There is a Pet Sitting and Dog Walking Business Course offered by NarpsUK, the professional association of pet sitters and dog walkers with more than a thousand members.
As NarpsUK’s support manager, Marion Lewis says: “The course we offer makes setting up a dog walking business a lot easier for people, such as providing readymade risk assessment forms needed by local councils or disclaimers for, for example, dog owners who welcome their hounds to roam free.”
Your clients and yourself are protected by this requirement. If you walk a dog and it causes an accident or injures another dog or person, you must have public liability insurance. It would be a good idea to purchase dog walking insurance that would cover you if the dog is injured or gets sick while you are caring for it.
Your insurance company may charge you an additional premium if you use your car or home for your new dog walking business.
Taking out Employer’s Liability Insurance is also important if your dog walking business takes off and you have to hire extra help.
For these examples of sole traders UK, You’ll need a Criminal Record Check if you are holding a dog owner’s keys and entering their home. Disclosure and Barring Service checks are available for 23 pounds in England and Wales.
Northern Ireland and Scotland have different application processes. For a Basic Disclosure, which costs $25, you need to live at your current address for at least a year. AccessNI charges £18 for a basic check.
The Criminal Records Check costs £65 if you haven’t lived at your address for a year.
There are no start-up costs when starting a dog-walking business. If you have just one dog, you can bootstrap (or should that be “leadstrap”) your business. Once you start taking more dogs out, you may buy crates, a ramp for dogs to climb into the van, and sign writing on the side.
If you drop off leaflets at local dog-grooming parlours, vets, and dog trainers, you can advertise your dog-walking business for free.
Dog walkers can earn different amounts depending on their location. For these examples of sole traders in the UK, there is a charge of £25 per dog for walks in well-heeled neighbourhoods, such as Richmond, a London suburb. Towns and cities are better places to start a dog-walking business.
Walking dogs for 30 minutes to an hour costs an average of £10-£25 in the UK. A NarpsUK member typically walks 12 dogs per day and earns an hourly rate of £15 per dog walk. An estimated £26,000 a year is the income potential of a reasonably busy dog walker, according to a 2015 survey published by Direct Line Pet Insurance.
Home boarding is another option, in which owners leave their dogs at someone else’s home rather than kennels when they go abroad. The cost of overnight stays per dog can range from £25 to £30 per night.
USEFUL LINKS: Setup as a sole Trader in UK