Hiring Independent Contractors: The Employers' Legal Guide (Working with Independent Contractors: The Employer's Legal Guide) (Paperback)

~ (Author) "This is a book about the legal ins and outs of hiring and working with independent contractors (ICs)-people who contract to work for others without..." (more)
Key Phrases: many hiring firms, federal unemployment compensation payments, retirement plan audits, Social Security, New York, New Jersey (more...)

Editorial Reviews

Review

Comprehensive, current and savvy, this is highly recommended... -- Library Journal

Explains the proper relationship between a company and a contractor. -- San Francisco Examiner & Chronicle

Product Description

Using independent contractors can save you a bundle in payroll taxes, health insurance costs, workers’ compensation premiums and overtime pay.

But the rules about who qualifies are complicated, and the IRS and state revenue agencies keep a close eye on businesses that hire independent contractors. Misclassifying a worker can result in serious financial penalties in a state or federal audit.

Now for the first time in decades, the IRS has made the rules about hiring independent contractors a lot simpler. New IRS rules make it easier for employers to prove that a worker is an independent contractor; they also allow employers that have misclassified workers to pay reduced assessments and penalties—or avoid them altogether.

Hiring Independent Contractors reflects these important IRS changes and shows employers how to:

* assess who qualifies as an independent contractor
* hire ICs without risking an audit
* retain ownership of intellectual property when using ICs
* handle an IRS audit
* take advantage of the IRS's "Safe Harbor" law

All independent contractor agreements are included on disk and as tear-outs.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 295 pages
• Publisher: Nolo.com; 3rd edition (September 1999)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0873375769
• ISBN-13: 978-0873375764
• Product Dimensions: 10.9 x 8.4 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.7 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #1,654,034 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The details on the topic of independent contractors., August 14, 2003

By	Harinath Thummalapalli (Austin, TX United States) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

You will find a general treatment of the topic of Independent Contractors (IC) in other Nolo guides but if you want a definitive and detailed guide, this is the book for you. All the way from templates of general independent contractor forms on CD-ROM to a thorough analysis of the various aspects of working with Independent Contractors, this book does a great job of discussing in plain English what every Small Business Owner needs to know. There is another Nolo guide on just the different contracts you could use for this purpose but this book contains most of those types of forms.

The book starts out with an introductory definition of an Independent Contractor and explains the benefits and risks of hiring one. The next natural step for every employer is to go through the process of determining the worker status and federal payroll taxes. After discussing this topic, the book explains the Safe Harbor Protection which is the process an IRS auditor is supposed to follow in determining if your classification of Independent Contractors should be questioned (something along these lines).

There are 3 chapters devoted to IRS specific topics - IRS Audits, tax rules for specific workers, and the IRS test for worker status. State payroll taxes, Workers' Compensation, hiring household workers, and labor/anti-discrimination laws are addressed after that.

The book then discusses the topic of Intellectual Property ownership in this context of Independent Contractors. This is followed by a few chapters on sample IC agreements, procedures for hiring ICs, how to avoid government audits etc. My favorite chapter is the Chapter 13: Intellectual Property Ownership as this can get very tricky if you aren't careful. In my business, this also happens to be one of the biggest risks in hiring ICs for our work instead of employees.

Overall, this is an excellent book that explains in plain English (as Nolo always does) of the intricacies involved in working with ICs. Of course, as some large corporations in the computer industry found out, it isn't that straight forward. So this book only helps you do some of the right things and avoid the obvious problems but there is no substitute for a good lawyer who can handle the more difficult issues.

Good luck!