WAN Contracts in the North of England

Wide Area Network (WAN)
England > North of England

The table below provides summary statistics for contract job vacancies advertised in the North of England requiring WAN skills. It includes a benchmarking guide to the contractor rates offered in vacancies that cited WAN over the 6 months leading up to 13 May 2025, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
13 May 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 93 113 87
Rank change year-on-year +20 -26 +4
Contract jobs citing WAN 72 72 130
As % of all contract jobs advertised in the North of England 2.20% 1.54% 2.28%
As % of the Communications & Networking category 13.14% 12.72% 19.32%
Number of daily rates quoted 50 43 93
10th Percentile £221 £211 £206
25th Percentile £325 £313 £288
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £438 £425 £375
Median % change year-on-year +2.94% +13.33% -8.64%
75th Percentile £500 £534 £538
90th Percentile £588 £638 £588
England median daily rate £500 £500 £463
% change year-on-year - +8.11% +3.64%
Number of hourly rates quoted 0 5 2
10th Percentile - - £22.93
25th Percentile - £23.92 £24.31
Median hourly rate - £24.87 £27.25
Median % change year-on-year - -8.73% +48.74%
75th Percentile - £25.83 £30.81
90th Percentile - £37.93 £32.58
England median hourly rate £45.00 £24.69 £60.00
% change year-on-year +82.30% -58.86% +130.77%

All Communications and Computer Networking Skills
North of England

WAN falls under the Communications and Computer Networking category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring communications or computer networking skills in the North of England.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for communications or computer networking skills 548 566 673
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the North of England 16.71% 12.11% 11.79%
Number of daily rates quoted 319 392 454
10th Percentile £184 £200 £200
25th Percentile £250 £313 £325
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £450 £475 £475
Median % change year-on-year -5.26% - +5.56%
75th Percentile £538 £612 £568
90th Percentile £625 £750 £675
England median daily rate £500 £498 £525
% change year-on-year +0.50% -5.24% +5.00%
Number of hourly rates quoted 3 26 49
10th Percentile £20.00 £13.31 -
25th Percentile £21.12 £18.89 £9.80
Median hourly rate £24.59 £24.87 £10.63
Median % change year-on-year -1.15% +133.96% -42.54%
75th Percentile £25.47 £45.88 £15.72
90th Percentile £25.90 £48.75 £34.00
England median hourly rate £28.00 £40.00 £18.50
% change year-on-year -30.00% +116.22% -22.63%

WAN
Job Vacancy Trend in the North of England

Job postings citing WAN as a proportion of all IT jobs advertised in the North of England.

Job vacancy trend for WAN in the North of England

WAN
Contractor Daily Rate Trend in the North of England

3-month moving average daily rate quoted in jobs citing WAN in the North of England.

Daily rate trend for WAN in the North of England

WAN
Daily Rate Histogram in the North of England

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing WAN in the North of England over the 6 months to 13 May 2025.

Daily rate histogram for WAN in the North of England

WAN
Contractor Hourly Rate Trend in the North of England

3-month moving average hourly rates quoted in jobs citing WAN in the North of England.

Hourly rate trend for WAN in the North of England

WAN
Contract Job Locations in the North of England

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing WAN within the North of England region over the 6 months to 13 May 2025. 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
North West +38 52 £450 +28.57% 33
Yorkshire -6 17 £400 -20.40% 30
North East -6 2 £375 -6.25% 13
WAN
England

WAN
Co-occurring Skills and Capabilities in the North of England by Category

The follow tables expand on the table above by listing co-occurrences grouped by category. The same employment type, locality and period is covered with up to 20 co-occurrences shown in each of the following categories:

Application Platforms
1 11 (15.28%) Microsoft Exchange
2 4 (5.56%) SharePoint
2 4 (5.56%) Skype for Business
Applications
1 14 (19.44%) Microsoft Office
2 5 (6.94%) MS Visio
3 2 (2.78%) Microsoft Excel
3 2 (2.78%) Microsoft PowerPoint
Business Applications
1 3 (4.17%) Remedy ITSM
Cloud Services
1 9 (12.50%) Azure
2 8 (11.11%) Microsoft 365
3 5 (6.94%) Entra ID
4 4 (5.56%) AWS
4 4 (5.56%) OneDrive
5 2 (2.78%) GCP
6 1 (1.39%) Cloudflare
Communications & Networking
1 39 (54.17%) LAN
2 38 (52.78%) Wi-Fi
3 37 (51.39%) Firewall
4 26 (36.11%) VPN
5 20 (27.78%) SD-WAN
6 18 (25.00%) NetScaler
7 16 (22.22%) Network Security
7 16 (22.22%) Wireless
8 15 (20.83%) Cisco ISE
9 13 (18.06%) DNS
10 10 (13.89%) BGP
10 10 (13.89%) Ethernet
10 10 (13.89%) MPLS
10 10 (13.89%) OSPF
11 9 (12.50%) Cisco Nexus
11 9 (12.50%) DHCP
11 9 (12.50%) VLAN
12 8 (11.11%) DWDM
13 7 (9.72%) IPsec
14 6 (8.33%) Internet
Database & Business Intelligence
1 4 (5.56%) SQL Server
2 1 (1.39%) MySQL
2 1 (1.39%) PostgreSQL
Development Applications
1 3 (4.17%) Sonatype Nexus
General
1 7 (9.72%) Social Skills
2 5 (6.94%) Analytical Skills
2 5 (6.94%) Banking
2 5 (6.94%) Public Sector
3 4 (5.56%) Inclusion and Diversity
4 3 (4.17%) Finance
4 3 (4.17%) Legal
4 3 (4.17%) Telecoms
5 1 (1.39%) Documentation Skills
5 1 (1.39%) Law
5 1 (1.39%) Presentation Skills
5 1 (1.39%) Social Housing
Job Titles
1 46 (63.89%) Network Engineer
2 13 (18.06%) SC Cleared Network Engineer
3 7 (9.72%) Support Engineer
4 6 (8.33%) Implementation Engineer
4 6 (8.33%) Network Implementation Engineer
5 4 (5.56%) Cisco Engineer
5 4 (5.56%) Cisco Network Engineer
5 4 (5.56%) Infrastructure Engineer
5 4 (5.56%) Senior
6 3 (4.17%) IP Engineer
6 3 (4.17%) IT Engineer
6 3 (4.17%) Senior Network Engineer
7 2 (2.78%) Desktop Engineer
7 2 (2.78%) Desktop Support Engineer
7 2 (2.78%) Lead
7 2 (2.78%) Network Analyst
7 2 (2.78%) Network Infrastructure Engineer
7 2 (2.78%) Technical Engineer
7 2 (2.78%) Technical Support Engineer
7 2 (2.78%) Transmission Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 15 (20.83%) 802.1X
Miscellaneous
1 17 (23.61%) Data Centre
2 6 (8.33%) Management Information System
3 5 (6.94%) CMDB
3 5 (6.94%) Video Conferencing
4 3 (4.17%) IVR
5 2 (2.78%) Self-Motivation
6 1 (1.39%) Driving Licence
6 1 (1.39%) Operational Technology
6 1 (1.39%) SCADA
6 1 (1.39%) Security Posture
6 1 (1.39%) Smartphone
Operating Systems
1 14 (19.44%) Windows
2 8 (11.11%) Windows 10
3 5 (6.94%) Linux
4 4 (5.56%) Windows 7
5 3 (4.17%) Android
5 3 (4.17%) Windows Server
5 3 (4.17%) Windows Server 2016
6 1 (1.39%) CentOS
6 1 (1.39%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
6 1 (1.39%) Ubuntu
Processes & Methodologies
1 23 (31.94%) Load Balancing
2 20 (27.78%) Network Design
3 17 (23.61%) Network Architecture
3 17 (23.61%) Network Management
4 13 (18.06%) ITIL
4 13 (18.06%) Problem-Solving
5 12 (16.67%) Impact Assessments
6 10 (13.89%) Customer Service
7 7 (9.72%) Analytics
8 6 (8.33%) Problem Management
8 6 (8.33%) Service Delivery
9 5 (6.94%) Asset Management
9 5 (6.94%) Change Management
9 5 (6.94%) Infrastructure Engineering
9 5 (6.94%) Network Monitoring
9 5 (6.94%) Performance Metrics
10 4 (5.56%) Disaster Recovery
10 4 (5.56%) Disk Encryption
10 4 (5.56%) ITSM
10 4 (5.56%) Service Management
Programming Languages
1 6 (8.33%) PowerShell
2 5 (6.94%) Python
3 4 (5.56%) VB
3 4 (5.56%) VBScript
4 1 (1.39%) Bash
4 1 (1.39%) Perl
4 1 (1.39%) SQL
Qualifications
1 32 (44.44%) SC Cleared
1 32 (44.44%) Security Cleared
2 27 (37.50%) Cisco Certification
3 17 (23.61%) CCNA
4 10 (13.89%) CCNP
5 9 (12.50%) Degree
6 3 (4.17%) CCIE
7 2 (2.78%) Computer Science Degree
7 2 (2.78%) JNCIA
7 2 (2.78%) JNCIS
7 2 (2.78%) Network+ Certification
8 1 (1.39%) DBS Check
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 3 (4.17%) SLA
2 1 (1.39%) ISO/IEC 27001
2 1 (1.39%) PCI DSS
System Software
1 10 (13.89%) Active Directory
2 6 (8.33%) VMware Infrastructure
3 4 (5.56%) BitLocker
3 4 (5.56%) Virtual Servers
4 3 (4.17%) Microsoft Virtual Server
5 1 (1.39%) Hyper-V
Systems Management
1 8 (11.11%) SCCM
2 6 (8.33%) Ansible
3 5 (6.94%) Terraform
4 4 (5.56%) AppManager
5 1 (1.39%) Cisco Prime
5 1 (1.39%) FortiGate
Vendors
1 50 (69.44%) Cisco
2 23 (31.94%) Microsoft
2 23 (31.94%) Palo Alto
3 18 (25.00%) Meraki
4 6 (8.33%) VMware
5 5 (6.94%) Fortinet
6 4 (5.56%) Arista
6 4 (5.56%) Ivanti
6 4 (5.56%) ServiceNow
7 3 (4.17%) Apple
7 3 (4.17%) Aruba
7 3 (4.17%) BMC
7 3 (4.17%) Huawei
7 3 (4.17%) Remedy
8 2 (2.78%) HP
8 2 (2.78%) SolarWinds
8 2 (2.78%) Splunk
9 1 (1.39%) F5
9 1 (1.39%) McAfee
9 1 (1.39%) Red Hat