QA Contracts in the North West

Quality Assurance (QA)
England > North West

The table below provides summary statistics for contract job vacancies advertised in the North West requiring QA skills. It includes a benchmarking guide to the contractor rates offered in vacancies that cited QA over the 6 months leading up to 1 May 2025, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
1 May 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 63 54 63
Rank change year-on-year -9 +9 +15
Contract jobs citing QA 58 88 107
As % of all contract jobs advertised in the North West 2.95% 3.19% 3.35%
As % of the Quality Assurance & Compliance category 21.40% 18.33% 22.72%
Number of daily rates quoted 43 66 71
10th Percentile £352 £413 £200
25th Percentile £400 £463 £363
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £463 £500 £425
Median % change year-on-year -7.50% +17.65% -2.86%
75th Percentile £614 £598 £525
90th Percentile £713 £694 £588
England median daily rate £478 £516 £510
% change year-on-year -7.39% +1.18% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 2 5 3
10th Percentile £19.66 £15.23 £11.30
25th Percentile £30.01 £18.11 £12.13
Median hourly rate £48.13 £20.46 £14.00
Median % change year-on-year +135.24% +46.14% -77.60%
75th Percentile £67.13 £28.44 £19.13
90th Percentile £78.00 £54.88 £21.90
England median hourly rate £50.00 £15.75 £22.49
% change year-on-year +217.46% -29.95% -52.66%

All Quality Assurance and Compliance Skills
North West

QA falls under the Quality Assurance and Compliance category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring quality assurance or compliance skills in the North West.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for quality assurance or compliance skills 271 480 471
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the North West 13.77% 17.42% 14.75%
Number of daily rates quoted 182 265 293
10th Percentile £271 £325 £289
25th Percentile £375 £425 £391
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £475 £513 £475
Median % change year-on-year -7.32% +7.89% +2.70%
75th Percentile £587 £598 £588
90th Percentile £700 £694 £650
England median daily rate £513 £525 £525
% change year-on-year -2.38% - -
Number of hourly rates quoted 16 71 32
10th Percentile £13.50 - £24.44
25th Percentile £16.20 £10.95 £30.23
Median hourly rate £30.38 £12.84 £38.55
Median % change year-on-year +136.60% -66.69% +114.17%
75th Percentile £65.31 £26.66 £48.38
90th Percentile £84.33 £43.75 £66.05
England median hourly rate £34.75 £22.34 £41.50
% change year-on-year +55.55% -46.17% +50.91%

QA
Job Vacancy Trend in the North West

Job postings citing QA as a proportion of all IT jobs advertised in the North West.

Job vacancy trend for QA in the North West

QA
Contractor Daily Rate Trend in the North West

3-month moving average daily rate quoted in jobs citing QA in the North West.

Daily rate trend for QA in the North West

QA
Daily Rate Histogram in the North West

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing QA in the North West over the 6 months to 1 May 2025.

Daily rate histogram for QA in the North West

QA
Contractor Hourly Rate Trend in the North West

3-month moving average hourly rates quoted in jobs citing QA in the North West.

Hourly rate trend for QA in the North West

QA
Hourly Rate Histogram in the North West

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing QA in the North West over the 6 months to 1 May 2025.

Hourly rate histogram for QA in the North West

QA
Contract Job Locations in the North West

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing QA within the North West region over the 6 months to 1 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
Manchester -3 35 £485 -3.00% 128
Cheshire -11 8 £422 -11.16% 29
Cumbria - 5 - - 3
Lancashire +3 3 £523 -12.92% 79
Merseyside -2 1 - - 16
QA
England

QA
Co-occurring Skills and Capabilities in the North West 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 5 (8.62%) CICS
2 2 (3.45%) WebSphere
3 1 (1.72%) Microsoft Exchange
Applications
1 1 (1.72%) Microsoft Excel
1 1 (1.72%) Microsoft Office
1 1 (1.72%) Microsoft Project
Business Applications
1 10 (17.24%) SAP S/4HANA
2 6 (10.34%) SAP PP
Cloud Services
1 13 (22.41%) AWS
2 12 (20.69%) Azure
3 7 (12.07%) GCP
4 3 (5.17%) SuccessFactors
5 2 (3.45%) GitHub
5 2 (3.45%) GitHub Actions
6 1 (1.72%) Azure Data Factory
6 1 (1.72%) Azure Synapse Analytics
6 1 (1.72%) SaaS
Database & Business Intelligence
1 3 (5.17%) MySQL
1 3 (5.17%) NoSQL
1 3 (5.17%) PostgreSQL
1 3 (5.17%) SAP HANA
2 2 (3.45%) Data Warehouse
2 2 (3.45%) DB2
2 2 (3.45%) Easytrieve
2 2 (3.45%) Hadoop
2 2 (3.45%) Metadata
2 2 (3.45%) ObjectStore
Development Applications
1 4 (6.90%) JIRA
2 2 (3.45%) Cucumber
2 2 (3.45%) Git
2 2 (3.45%) GitLab
2 2 (3.45%) Jenkins
2 2 (3.45%) REST Assured
2 2 (3.45%) Selenium
2 2 (3.45%) SOAtest
3 1 (1.72%) JIRA Agile
3 1 (1.72%) WebDriver
3 1 (1.72%) Zephyr
General
1 19 (32.76%) Analytical Skills
1 19 (32.76%) Social Skills
2 8 (13.79%) Legal
2 8 (13.79%) Manufacturing
3 7 (12.07%) Telecoms
4 6 (10.34%) Banking
4 6 (10.34%) Finance
5 4 (6.90%) Aerospace
6 3 (5.17%) Pharmaceutical
7 2 (3.45%) Games
7 2 (3.45%) General Ledger
7 2 (3.45%) Public Sector
7 2 (3.45%) Retail Banking
8 1 (1.72%) Avionics
8 1 (1.72%) Inclusion and Diversity
8 1 (1.72%) Military
8 1 (1.72%) Organisational Skills
8 1 (1.72%) Retail
Job Titles
1 12 (20.69%) Architect
2 10 (17.24%) Solutions Architect
3 7 (12.07%) Test Manager
4 6 (10.34%) Analyst
5 5 (8.62%) QA Engineer
6 4 (6.90%) Consultant
6 4 (6.90%) Developer
6 4 (6.90%) SAP Consultant
6 4 (6.90%) SAP PP Consultant
6 4 (6.90%) SAP QM Consultant
6 4 (6.90%) SAP S/4HANA Consultant
6 4 (6.90%) Senior
7 3 (5.17%) Data Engineer
7 3 (5.17%) Migration Manager
7 3 (5.17%) SAP Architect
7 3 (5.17%) SAP Solutions Architect
7 3 (5.17%) Software Developer
8 2 (3.45%) Business Analyst
8 2 (3.45%) Management Consultant
8 2 (3.45%) Senior Software Developer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 4 (6.90%) Node.js
1 4 (6.90%) Web Services
2 3 (5.17%) Middleware
2 3 (5.17%) React
3 2 (3.45%) .NET
3 2 (3.45%) AngularJS
3 2 (3.45%) J2EE
3 2 (3.45%) JSON
3 2 (3.45%) Playwright
3 2 (3.45%) REST
3 2 (3.45%) RESTful
3 2 (3.45%) XML
4 1 (1.72%) .NET Core
4 1 (1.72%) ISPF
Miscellaneous
1 6 (10.34%) Virtual Team
2 5 (8.62%) Data Centre
2 5 (8.62%) Mainframe
3 4 (6.90%) Life Science
3 4 (6.90%) VSAM
4 3 (5.17%) Public Cloud
5 2 (3.45%) Mobile Payment
6 1 (1.72%) Cloud Native
6 1 (1.72%) CMDB
6 1 (1.72%) Distributed Applications
6 1 (1.72%) LIMS
6 1 (1.72%) Operational Technology
6 1 (1.72%) SCADA
Operating Systems
1 3 (5.17%) Unix
1 3 (5.17%) zOS
Processes & Methodologies
1 19 (32.76%) Problem-Solving
2 14 (24.14%) Test Strategy
3 13 (22.41%) Agile
4 12 (20.69%) Test Automation
5 11 (18.97%) Risk Management
6 10 (17.24%) Migration
6 10 (17.24%) User Acceptance Testing
7 9 (15.52%) CI/CD
7 9 (15.52%) Software Engineering
8 8 (13.79%) Computer Science
8 8 (13.79%) Test Planning
9 7 (12.07%) SDLC
9 7 (12.07%) Stakeholder Management
10 6 (10.34%) Analytics
10 6 (10.34%) Continuous Improvement
10 6 (10.34%) Data Pipeline
10 6 (10.34%) ETL
10 6 (10.34%) Performance Testing
10 6 (10.34%) Quality Management
10 6 (10.34%) Virtual Team Management
Programming Languages
1 6 (10.34%) Java
1 6 (10.34%) JavaScript
1 6 (10.34%) Python
1 6 (10.34%) SQL
2 5 (8.62%) JCL
3 4 (6.90%) COBOL
4 2 (3.45%) REXX
Qualifications
1 20 (34.48%) Security Cleared
2 17 (29.31%) SC Cleared
3 12 (20.69%) Degree
4 8 (13.79%) Computer Science Degree
5 7 (12.07%) AWS Certification
5 7 (12.07%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
5 7 (12.07%) Azure Certification
5 7 (12.07%) Microsoft Certification
6 4 (6.90%) BPSS Clearance
7 1 (1.72%) ISTQB
7 1 (1.72%) ISTQB Advanced Certification
7 1 (1.72%) Master's Degree
7 1 (1.72%) SAP Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 4 (6.90%) Data Quality
2 2 (3.45%) Software Quality Assurance
3 1 (1.72%) Accessibility
3 1 (1.72%) GxP
3 1 (1.72%) HIPAA
System Software
1 1 (1.72%) Time Sharing Option
Systems Management
1 5 (8.62%) SCCM
2 2 (3.45%) Kubernetes
3 1 (1.72%) CA Endevor
3 1 (1.72%) HP ALM
Vendors
1 12 (20.69%) SAP
2 10 (17.24%) Microsoft
3 7 (12.07%) Google
4 6 (10.34%) Oracle
5 5 (8.62%) Informatica
6 4 (6.90%) Databricks
7 3 (5.17%) Concur
7 3 (5.17%) MuleSoft
7 3 (5.17%) Talend
8 2 (3.45%) Ab Initio
8 2 (3.45%) Parasoft
9 1 (1.72%) HP
9 1 (1.72%) IBM
9 1 (1.72%) ServiceNow
9 1 (1.72%) Virgin Media