If you're planning to move to London and will be getting a job, here are a few things you should know
about working here. Now these tips are for people who aren't from the UK
so aren't familiar with the working culture here and
they're also for people who already have the right to work here
so I'm not gonna be talking about getting a Visa or anything like that and I can't help with that.
Salaries are paid monthly.
As an American I'm pretty used to getting paid twice a month,
here they pay monthly and it's typically at the end of the month but it kind of depends.
Back in my permanent job days I had to learn how to budget a little bit better
to make that one monthly payment stretch a little bit further.
Also freelance work and hourly jobs and part time jobs that can totally vary.
You might not live close to where you work.
Because of the prices of rent in London it's very common for people to live in totally different areas
from where they work specially if they work in central London
it's really hard to be able to afford to actually live in central London.
So you are gonna need to keep this in mind when you're planning where your job is gonna be
and also where you are going to live.
I do talk about this in a couple of my videos about where to live
and how to find a place to live when you move to London.
You can watch on one those by clicking the card popping up there.
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So download the free app and see what's available even if you haven't quite moved to London just yet
it can give you an idea of what's out there, what salaries are like...
You can get the app by clicking the link down in the description of this video.
You will be on a contract no matter what type of job that you get.
Again this is a little different for me coming from the US where part time workers and hourly workers
typically aren't on a contract that stipulates how much holiday time that you get off
and things beyond really, like this is what you get paid...
But yeah most jobs here you're going to end up signing a contract and you will probably also have a notice period.
And of course if you are a freelancer you definitely always want to have a contract in place that stipulates
how much you're getting paid and all the usual freelancer stuff.
Americans here is one to blow your mind,
it is UK law for employers to give employees at minimum 20 days of holidays time or vacation time a year.
This is so different from the US obviously, which, there's no minimum in the US
and on average employers usually give around 10 days of holiday a year.
And then if you are working part-time or like hourly, I don't even think they usually give holiday time at all,
you just don't get paid if you take time off.
If you are from another country besides the UK or the US let me know in the comments
what the holiday time is like in the country you are from.
You'll work with a diverse group of people.
Because London is so diverse you're most likely gonna end up working with other employees
and also costumers that are from all around the world and might have varying accents, English abilities
and also just cultural differences.
So this is your first job in London it would be worth mentioning any experience that you have in dealing
with people that are different from you in the past while you're in your interview.
Notice periods can be really long.
By notice period I mean the amount of time that you have to stay in your role after you submit your resignation
Now this typically pertains more to roles that are office based and like for salary,
full-time permanents employees.
Typically a notice period for lower level employees will be around one month
but then as you are mid-level, executive-level it can be 6 months or even a year.
In terms of part-time and salary work, from asking around with my friends it seems like that
it just completely depends on the company and what's in the contract that you've signed
when you started working for them.
You need an NI number to work.
If you are not British you need to apply for an NI number or a National Insurance Number,
when you get to London in order to be able to work and also do some other things
like opening a bank account and get a mobile phone.
So as soon as you get to London arrange for you appointment to get your NI number
and as soon as you have applied for it you can start working legally.
There's a lot of talking around London about the minimum wage versus living wage
Minimum wage is the national minimum that employers in the UK must pay their employees
which at the time of recording is 7.83£ if you are 25 or older,
7.38£ if you are 21 to 24 years old and 5.90£ if you are 18 to 20 years old.
Then there is the real living wage which is calculated by the living wage foundation
which at the time of recording is 10.20£ for London specifically.
This is the number that represents how much somebody would realistically need to be earning
in order to actually survive living in London.
Unfortunately, the living wage is not enforced by law, it's only a suggestion at this point.
Londoners work long hours-ish.
I'm a New Yorker and if were working full time right now back in New York I'd probably be averaging
about 55 hours of work a week including late nights and weekend work.
It's just how it is when working in New York City so comparatively speaking
I think actually working in London, in let's say office full-time permanent positions,
people here tend to have a better work-life balance.
That being said if we compare how much Londoners work to the rest of the UK and also the rest of Europe ,
it is a lot more than the average pretty much anywhere else.
So depending on where you are from you'll probably notice a difference from what you're used to.
This video is part of my living in London series, there's lots of videos in which I talk about
moving to London, living in London, working in London, my experience living here as American...
You can watch one of those videos by clicking the boxes I have popped up here.
And I will see you in the next video.