2nd Line Support Contract Job Trends in England

Second Line Support
UK > England

The median Second Line Support daily rate in England is £200, according to job vacancies posted in the 6 months leading up to 18 May 2026.

The table below compares current contractor rates and summary statistics with the previous two years.

6 months to
18 May 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 457 348 342
Rank change year-on-year -109 -6 -22
Contract jobs requiring a 2nd Line Support 128 139 199
As % of all contract jobs in England 0.31% 0.57% 0.55%
As % of the Job Titles category 0.34% 0.61% 0.59%
Number of daily rates quoted 67 103 151
10th Percentile £163 £153 £150
25th Percentile £183 £188 £175
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £200 £222 £200
Median % change year-on-year -9.71% +10.75% -4.76%
75th Percentile £239 £269 £238
90th Percentile £289 £288 £300
UK median daily rate £208 £220 £200
% change year-on-year -5.68% +10.00% -2.44%
Number of hourly rates quoted 21 17 17
10th Percentile £12.78 £18.34 £14.27
25th Percentile £12.95 £24.25 £17.25
Median hourly rate £16.50 £28.00 £17.72
Median % change year-on-year -41.07% +58.01% -12.32%
75th Percentile £20.25 - £20.37
90th Percentile £24.20 £31.50 £23.77
UK median hourly rate £16.50 £26.98 £17.72
% change year-on-year -38.83% +52.23% -11.40%

All Contract IT Job Roles
England

For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract IT job vacancies in England. Most job vacancies include a discernible job title that can be normalized. As such, the figures in the second row provide an indication of the number of contract jobs in our overall sample.

Contract vacancies in England with a recognized job title 37,836 22,609 33,815
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 92.34% 92.39% 92.78%
Number of daily rates quoted 23,491 15,046 22,418
10th Percentile £319 £296 £284
25th Percentile £413 £406 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £513 £523 £525
Median % change year-on-year -2.01% -0.38% -4.55%
75th Percentile £625 £638 £644
90th Percentile £725 £750 £750
UK median daily rate £510 £513 £525
% change year-on-year -0.49% -2.38% -2.82%
Number of hourly rates quoted 2,612 915 2,440
10th Percentile £15.72 £14.00 £12.86
25th Percentile £20.79 £18.50 £16.30
Median hourly rate £45.59 £30.00 £36.92
Median % change year-on-year +51.95% -18.73% -17.54%
75th Percentile £67.50 £63.75 £61.30
90th Percentile £78.75 £75.00 £73.75
UK median hourly rate £43.00 £28.15 £36.50
% change year-on-year +52.75% -22.88% -18.89%

2nd Line Support
Job Vacancy Trend in England

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings featuring '2nd Line Support' in the job title relative to all contract IT jobs advertised in England.

2nd Line Support job vacancy trend in England

2nd Line Support
Daily Rate Trend in England

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for 2nd Line Support job vacancies in England.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for 2nd Line Support job vacancies in England

2nd Line Support
Daily Rate Histogram in England

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing 2nd Line Support in England over the 6 months to 18 May 2026.

Daily rate histogram for 2nd Line Support in England

2nd Line Support
Hourly Rate Trend in England

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for 2nd Line Support job vacancies in England.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for 2nd Line Support job vacancies in England

2nd Line Support
Hourly Rate Histogram in England

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing 2nd Line Support in England over the 6 months to 18 May 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for 2nd Line Support in England

2nd Line Support
Contract Job Locations in England

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing 2nd Line Support within the England region over the 6 months to 18 May 2026. The 'Rank Change' column provides an indication of the change in demand within each location based on the same 6 month period last year.

Location Rank Change
on Same Period
Last Year
Matching
Contract
IT Job Ads
Median
Daily Rate
Past 6 Months
Median Daily Rate
% Change
on Same Period
Last Year
Live
Jobs
London -55 40 £235 -6.00% 15
North of England -66 32 £190 -2.56% 12
South East -75 27 £204 -7.39% 27
Yorkshire -50 17 £190 +50.79% 6
Midlands -69 17 £230 +15.00% 10
North West -34 15 £175 -14.63% 5
West Midlands -60 11 £230 -16.36% 7
South West -21 6 - - 6
East of England -30 6 £240 +6.67% 9
East Midlands -30 6 - - 3
2nd Line Support
UK

2nd Line Support Skill Set
Top 30 Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in England

For the 6 months to 18 May 2026, 2nd Line Support contract job roles required the following skills and capabilities in order of popularity. The figures indicate the absolute number of co-occurrences and as a proportion of all contract job ads across the England region featuring 2nd Line Support in the job title.

1 90 (70.31%) Windows
2 68 (53.13%) Microsoft 365
3 53 (41.41%) Microsoft
4 48 (37.50%) Customer Service
5 46 (35.94%) Active Directory
6 37 (28.91%) Windows 10
7 28 (21.88%) Problem-Solving
8 25 (19.53%) Android
8 25 (19.53%) Azure
9 24 (18.75%) Microsoft Intune
10 22 (17.19%) ITIL
11 21 (16.41%) Apple iOS
12 18 (14.06%) ITSM
12 18 (14.06%) Service Delivery
13 16 (12.50%) Entra ID
14 15 (11.72%) Microsoft Office
14 15 (11.72%) SCCM
14 15 (11.72%) ServiceNow
14 15 (11.72%) Wi-Fi
15 13 (10.16%) Continuous Improvement
16 12 (9.38%) Customer Experience
16 12 (9.38%) DNS
16 12 (9.38%) JIRA
16 12 (9.38%) Service Management
17 11 (8.59%) DHCP
17 11 (8.59%) Microsoft Exchange
17 11 (8.59%) SQL
18 10 (7.81%) LAN
18 10 (7.81%) SharePoint
18 10 (7.81%) User Experience

2nd Line Support Skill Set
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in England by Category

The following tables expand on the one above by listing co-occurrences grouped by category. They cover the same employment type, locality and period, with up to 20 co-occurrences shown in each category:

Application Platforms
1 11 (8.59%) Microsoft Exchange
2 10 (7.81%) SharePoint
3 2 (1.56%) Confluence
3 2 (1.56%) IIS
Applications
1 15 (11.72%) Microsoft Office
2 1 (0.78%) Microsoft Excel
Business Applications
1 7 (5.47%) Remedy ITSM
Cloud Services
1 68 (53.13%) Microsoft 365
2 25 (19.53%) Azure
3 16 (12.50%) Entra ID
4 9 (7.03%) AWS
5 5 (3.91%) GCP
5 5 (3.91%) OneDrive
6 2 (1.56%) Amazon CloudWatch
6 2 (1.56%) Amazon S3
6 2 (1.56%) AWS Lambda
6 2 (1.56%) Serverless
7 1 (0.78%) Google Workspace
7 1 (0.78%) Power Platform
Communications & Networking
1 15 (11.72%) Wi-Fi
2 12 (9.38%) DNS
3 11 (8.59%) DHCP
4 10 (7.81%) LAN
4 10 (7.81%) WAN
5 9 (7.03%) VPN
6 4 (3.13%) TCP/IP
7 2 (1.56%) BGP
7 2 (1.56%) Firewall
7 2 (1.56%) Internet
7 2 (1.56%) IPsec
7 2 (1.56%) MPLS
7 2 (1.56%) Skype
7 2 (1.56%) VLAN
8 1 (0.78%) Remote Desktop
8 1 (0.78%) SAN
8 1 (0.78%) Wireless
Database & Business Intelligence
1 6 (4.69%) SQL Server
2 5 (3.91%) MySQL
3 2 (1.56%) Amazon Redshift
4 1 (0.78%) Amazon RDS
4 1 (0.78%) Power BI
Development Applications
1 12 (9.38%) JIRA
General
1 64 (50.00%) Social Skills
2 21 (16.41%) Finance
3 15 (11.72%) Retail
4 13 (10.16%) Analytical Skills
5 12 (9.38%) Public Sector
6 10 (7.81%) Manufacturing
6 10 (7.81%) Organisational Skills
7 7 (5.47%) French Language
7 7 (5.47%) Spanish Language
8 6 (4.69%) Inclusion and Diversity
9 5 (3.91%) Banking
10 3 (2.34%) Legal
11 2 (1.56%) Investment Banking
12 1 (0.78%) Documentation Skills
12 1 (0.78%) Law
12 1 (0.78%) Military
12 1 (0.78%) Telecoms
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 2 (1.56%) Software Packaging
Miscellaneous
1 15 (11.72%) Onboarding
2 7 (5.47%) Driving Licence
3 6 (4.69%) NHS
3 6 (4.69%) Smartphone
4 5 (3.91%) Mobile Payment
5 3 (2.34%) CCTV
5 3 (2.34%) iPhone
5 3 (2.34%) Self-Motivation
6 2 (1.56%) PKI
7 1 (0.78%) Team-Oriented Environment
7 1 (0.78%) Video Conferencing
Operating Systems
1 90 (70.31%) Windows
2 37 (28.91%) Windows 10
3 25 (19.53%) Android
4 21 (16.41%) Apple iOS
5 10 (7.81%) Windows Server
6 6 (4.69%) Mac OS
7 2 (1.56%) Windows Server 2012
8 1 (0.78%) Linux
8 1 (0.78%) Windows 7
Processes & Methodologies
1 48 (37.50%) Customer Service
2 28 (21.88%) Problem-Solving
3 22 (17.19%) ITIL
4 18 (14.06%) ITSM
4 18 (14.06%) Service Delivery
5 13 (10.16%) Continuous Improvement
6 12 (9.38%) Customer Experience
6 12 (9.38%) Service Management
7 10 (7.81%) User Experience
8 8 (6.25%) Problem Management
9 7 (5.47%) Asset Management
10 6 (4.69%) Migration
10 6 (4.69%) Mobile Device Management
11 5 (3.91%) AI
11 5 (3.91%) Process Improvement
12 4 (3.13%) BCP
12 4 (3.13%) Generative AI
13 3 (2.34%) Platform Engineering
13 3 (2.34%) RBAC
13 3 (2.34%) Validation
Programming Languages
1 11 (8.59%) SQL
2 1 (0.78%) PowerShell
Qualifications
1 6 (4.69%) Degree
2 5 (3.91%) SC Cleared
2 5 (3.91%) Security Cleared
3 3 (2.34%) Computer Science Degree
3 3 (2.34%) DBS Check
3 3 (2.34%) ITIL Certification
4 2 (1.56%) CCNA
4 2 (1.56%) Cisco Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 4 (3.13%) SLA
2 2 (1.56%) Cyber Essentials
3 1 (0.78%) GDPR
System Software
1 46 (35.94%) Active Directory
2 2 (1.56%) Virtual Desktop
3 1 (0.78%) Virtual Servers
Systems Management
1 24 (18.75%) Microsoft Intune
2 15 (11.72%) SCCM
3 2 (1.56%) AirWatch
3 2 (1.56%) Jamf Pro
4 1 (0.78%) Single Sign-On
4 1 (0.78%) WSUS
Vendors
1 53 (41.41%) Microsoft
2 15 (11.72%) ServiceNow
3 7 (5.47%) Remedy
4 6 (4.69%) Google
5 5 (3.91%) Apple
5 5 (3.91%) HP
6 3 (2.34%) Bloomberg
7 2 (1.56%) Cisco
7 2 (1.56%) Dell
7 2 (1.56%) Freshdesk
7 2 (1.56%) Juniper
7 2 (1.56%) Meraki
8 1 (0.78%) Charles River
8 1 (0.78%) Citrix
8 1 (0.78%) Tanium
8 1 (0.78%) VMware