Sarbanes-Oxley Contract Job Trends

Sarbanes-Oxley (SOX, Sarbox)
UK

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs requiring Sarbanes-Oxley skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 2 September 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
2 Sep 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 502 389 484
Rank change year-on-year -113 +95 -9
Contract jobs citing Sarbanes-Oxley 173 174 98
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 0.32% 0.53% 0.25%
As % of the Quality Assurance & Compliance category 1.85% 3.15% 1.89%
Number of daily rates quoted 111 109 68
10th Percentile £413 £408 £353
25th Percentile £425 £513 £398
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £563 £575 £568
Median % change year-on-year -2.17% +1.32% +13.50%
75th Percentile £604 £675 £652
90th Percentile £775 £755 £701
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £560 £525
% change year-on-year -10.63% +6.57% +5.00%
Number of hourly rates quoted 7 6 1
10th Percentile £50.00 £21.50 -
25th Percentile £55.63 £27.06 -
Median hourly rate £62.50 £65.00 £44.04
Median % change year-on-year -3.85% +47.59% +11.21%
75th Percentile £76.50 £91.56 -
90th Percentile £81.20 £92.50 -
UK excluding London median hourly rate £62.25 £23.00 £44.04
% change year-on-year +170.65% -47.77% +11.21%

All Quality Assurance and Compliance Skills
UK

Sarbanes-Oxley 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.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for quality assurance or compliance skills 9,351 5,529 5,192
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 17.45% 17.00% 13.44%
Number of daily rates quoted 5,932 3,549 3,155
10th Percentile £325 £285 £288
25th Percentile £413 £400 £400
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £500 £512
Median % change year-on-year - -2.34% -2.48%
75th Percentile £600 £606 £625
90th Percentile £700 £713 £738
UK excluding London median daily rate £490 £475 £483
% change year-on-year +3.16% -1.66% -3.40%
Number of hourly rates quoted 586 257 282
10th Percentile £13.86 £13.60 £11.81
25th Percentile £17.14 £16.50 £14.46
Median hourly rate £36.07 £30.00 £25.30
Median % change year-on-year +20.23% +18.58% -26.67%
75th Percentile £68.75 £60.00 £56.88
90th Percentile £78.35 £82.98 £70.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £36.07 £25.15 £24.18
% change year-on-year +43.42% +4.01% -28.76%

Sarbanes-Oxley
Job Vacancy Trend

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings citing Sarbanes-Oxley relative to all contract IT jobs advertised.

Sarbanes-Oxley job vacancy trend in the UK

Sarbanes-Oxley
Daily Rate Trend

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing Sarbanes-Oxley.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing Sarbanes-Oxley

Sarbanes-Oxley
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Sarbanes-Oxley over the 6 months to 2 September 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Sarbanes-Oxley in the UK

Sarbanes-Oxley
Hourly Rate Trend

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing Sarbanes-Oxley.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing Sarbanes-Oxley

Sarbanes-Oxley
Hourly Rate Histogram

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Sarbanes-Oxley over the 6 months to 2 September 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Sarbanes-Oxley in the UK

Sarbanes-Oxley
Top 14 Contract Job Locations

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing Sarbanes-Oxley within the UK over the 6 months to 2 September 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
England -110 154 £528 -7.78% 168
London -70 79 £588 -2.49% 120
UK excluding London -98 75 £500 -10.63% 66
Work from Home -54 68 £500 -13.04% 73
North of England -59 47 £450 -21.74% 11
North West -36 27 £569 -0.52% 7
Yorkshire -34 20 £450 -23.53% 4
South East -67 11 £519 -3.49% 16
East of England -22 8 £525 -17.65% 6
Midlands -53 5 £650 +23.81% 11
Scotland -22 3 £600 - 9
West Midlands -46 3 £650 +15.25% 6
East Midlands -14 2 £550 +24.29% 5
South West -49 1 £600 +19.40% 7

Sarbanes-Oxley
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities 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 7 (4.05%) Apache Spark
2 5 (2.89%) Apache
2 5 (2.89%) IIS
3 1 (0.58%) Apache Airflow
3 1 (0.58%) IBM HTTP Server
3 1 (0.58%) WebSphere
3 1 (0.58%) WebSphere Application Server
Applications
1 11 (6.36%) Microsoft Excel
2 2 (1.16%) Spreadsheet
3 1 (0.58%) Microsoft PowerPoint
3 1 (0.58%) Microsoft Project
Business Applications
1 17 (9.83%) SAP S/4HANA
2 6 (3.47%) NetSuite
3 4 (2.31%) HFM
3 4 (2.31%) Oracle Payables
3 4 (2.31%) Oracle Procure-to-Pay
4 2 (1.16%) OpenText VIM for SAP
4 2 (1.16%) Oracle ERP
4 2 (1.16%) Oracle Receivables
4 2 (1.16%) SAP CO
4 2 (1.16%) SAP FI
4 2 (1.16%) SAP FI/CO
5 1 (0.58%) Oracle Applications
5 1 (0.58%) Oracle Assets
5 1 (0.58%) Oracle Cash Management
5 1 (0.58%) SAP ECC
5 1 (0.58%) SAP GRC
Cloud Services
1 58 (33.53%) Azure
2 55 (31.79%) AWS
3 19 (10.98%) Entra ID
4 17 (9.83%) SaaS
5 15 (8.67%) GCP
6 11 (6.36%) Azure DevOps
7 6 (3.47%) Azure Sentinel
7 6 (3.47%) Power Platform
8 5 (2.89%) Microsoft 365
9 4 (2.31%) GitHub
9 4 (2.31%) Snowflake
10 3 (1.73%) IaaS
10 3 (1.73%) SuccessFactors
11 2 (1.16%) Amazon S3
11 2 (1.16%) Azure Cosmos DB
11 2 (1.16%) Azure Machine Learning
11 2 (1.16%) Cloud Computing
11 2 (1.16%) Matillion
11 2 (1.16%) Microsoft Purview
12 1 (0.58%) OCI
Communications & Networking
1 10 (5.78%) Network Security
2 8 (4.62%) Firewall
3 5 (2.89%) HTTPS
4 3 (1.73%) HTTP
5 1 (0.58%) Broadband
5 1 (0.58%) DNS
5 1 (0.58%) Kerberos
5 1 (0.58%) SAN
5 1 (0.58%) Structured Cabling
Database & Business Intelligence
1 8 (4.62%) Relational Database
2 7 (4.05%) SQL Server
3 6 (3.47%) Power BI
4 5 (2.89%) NoSQL
5 4 (2.31%) PostgreSQL
6 3 (1.73%) Apache Cassandra
6 3 (1.73%) Data Lake
6 3 (1.73%) RDBMS
6 3 (1.73%) SQL Server Integration Services
7 2 (1.16%) GIS
8 1 (0.58%) BigQuery
8 1 (0.58%) Delta Lake
8 1 (0.58%) DynamoDB
8 1 (0.58%) Elasticsearch
8 1 (0.58%) Metadata
8 1 (0.58%) MongoDB
8 1 (0.58%) Oracle Reports
8 1 (0.58%) Snowflake Schema
8 1 (0.58%) Spark SQL
8 1 (0.58%) Tableau
Development Applications
1 8 (4.62%) GitLab
2 5 (2.89%) Git
2 5 (2.89%) Jenkins
3 4 (2.31%) JIRA
4 2 (1.16%) ER Studio
5 1 (0.58%) Artifactory
5 1 (0.58%) Gradle
5 1 (0.58%) Introscope
5 1 (0.58%) Maven
5 1 (0.58%) SonarQube
5 1 (0.58%) TestRail
General
1 88 (50.87%) Finance
2 68 (39.31%) Social Skills
3 36 (20.81%) Analytical Skills
4 17 (9.83%) Legal
5 13 (7.51%) Banking
6 11 (6.36%) Influencing Skills
7 8 (4.62%) Organisational Skills
7 8 (4.62%) Pharmaceutical
8 5 (2.89%) Documentation Skills
8 5 (2.89%) Presentation Skills
9 3 (1.73%) Billing
9 3 (1.73%) Manufacturing
9 3 (1.73%) Telecoms
10 2 (1.16%) Retail
11 1 (0.58%) Back Office
11 1 (0.58%) Financial Institution
11 1 (0.58%) Legal Technology
11 1 (0.58%) Marketing
11 1 (0.58%) Public Sector
Job Titles
1 31 (17.92%) Architect
2 28 (16.18%) Lead
3 23 (13.29%) Analyst
4 17 (9.83%) Author
4 17 (9.83%) Technical Author
5 12 (6.94%) Consultant
6 11 (6.36%) SOX Analyst
7 9 (5.20%) IT Analyst
7 9 (5.20%) Senior
8 8 (4.62%) Business Analyst
8 8 (4.62%) Project Manager
9 7 (4.05%) Compliance Analyst
9 7 (4.05%) Finance Business Analyst
9 7 (4.05%) Financial Analyst
9 7 (4.05%) Java Engineer
9 7 (4.05%) SailPoint Architect
10 6 (3.47%) Data Engineer
11 5 (2.89%) Java Software Engineer
11 5 (2.89%) SIEM Engineer
11 5 (2.89%) Splunk Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 20 (11.56%) REST
2 15 (8.67%) LDAP
3 11 (6.36%) JDBC
4 10 (5.78%) SailPoint
4 10 (5.78%) SOAP
5 7 (4.05%) Spring
5 7 (4.05%) Spring Boot
6 6 (3.47%) OAuth
6 6 (3.47%) OpenID
6 6 (3.47%) SAML
7 5 (2.89%) AWS CDK
7 5 (2.89%) Jakarta EE
7 5 (2.89%) JSON
7 5 (2.89%) Oracle Fusion
8 4 (2.31%) Node.js
9 3 (1.73%) Middleware
10 2 (1.16%) pytest
10 2 (1.16%) Snowpark
10 2 (1.16%) Terraform
11 1 (0.58%) GraphQL
Miscellaneous
1 13 (7.51%) Onboarding
2 12 (6.94%) Cloud Native
3 11 (6.36%) Enterprise Software
4 9 (5.20%) Product Ownership
5 8 (4.62%) Management Information System
6 6 (3.47%) Reinsurance
6 6 (3.47%) Replication
7 5 (2.89%) Data Protection Act
8 4 (2.31%) Legacy Systems
8 4 (2.31%) Virtual Team
9 3 (1.73%) Augmented Reality
9 3 (1.73%) BYOD
9 3 (1.73%) Greenfield Project
9 3 (1.73%) Operational Technology
10 2 (1.16%) Data Centre
10 2 (1.16%) Foreign Exchange (FX)
10 2 (1.16%) Life Science
10 2 (1.16%) PKI
10 2 (1.16%) Security Posture
10 2 (1.16%) Team-Oriented Environment
Operating Systems
1 15 (8.67%) Windows
2 9 (5.20%) Linux
3 4 (2.31%) Unix
4 1 (0.58%) AIX
4 1 (0.58%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
Processes & Methodologies
1 45 (26.01%) Stakeholder Management
2 37 (21.39%) Agile
3 31 (17.92%) ERP
4 27 (15.61%) RBAC
5 26 (15.03%) Problem-Solving
6 25 (14.45%) Continuous Improvement
6 25 (14.45%) DevOps
7 24 (13.87%) Roadmaps
8 23 (13.29%) Cybersecurity
9 22 (12.72%) Identity Access Management
10 21 (12.14%) Change Management
10 21 (12.14%) Migration
11 19 (10.98%) CI/CD
12 17 (9.83%) AI
12 17 (9.83%) Information Security
13 16 (9.25%) Procure-to-Pay
13 16 (9.25%) Risk Management
13 16 (9.25%) Stakeholder Engagement
13 16 (9.25%) Zero Trust
14 15 (8.67%) Data Modelling
Programming Languages
1 28 (16.18%) SQL
2 25 (14.45%) Python
3 24 (13.87%) Java
4 18 (10.40%) PowerShell
5 5 (2.89%) BeanShell
5 5 (2.89%) Kusto Query Language
5 5 (2.89%) Search Processing Language
6 4 (2.31%) Bash
6 4 (2.31%) TypeScript
7 2 (1.16%) R
8 1 (0.58%) JavaScript
8 1 (0.58%) Jython
8 1 (0.58%) Shell Script
Qualifications
1 26 (15.03%) Degree
2 24 (13.87%) CISSP
3 15 (8.67%) ACCA
3 15 (8.67%) CISM
4 10 (5.78%) CIMA
4 10 (5.78%) PMI Certification
5 9 (5.20%) CISA
5 9 (5.20%) PMP
6 7 (4.05%) CRISC
7 5 (2.89%) GCFA
7 5 (2.89%) GCIH
7 5 (2.89%) Security Cleared
8 3 (1.73%) Azure Certification
9 2 (1.16%) Computer Science Degree
9 2 (1.16%) SAFe Agilist
10 1 (0.58%) (ISC)2 CCSP
10 1 (0.58%) Cisco Certification
10 1 (0.58%) ISTQB
10 1 (0.58%) Master's Degree
10 1 (0.58%) SC Cleared
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 60 (34.68%) GDPR
2 37 (21.39%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 24 (13.87%) NIST
4 21 (12.14%) ITGC
5 18 (10.40%) GRC
6 16 (9.25%) HIPAA
7 14 (8.09%) PCI DSS
8 12 (6.94%) GAAP
8 12 (6.94%) IFRS
9 9 (5.20%) Data Quality
10 5 (2.89%) GxP
10 5 (2.89%) Solvency II
11 4 (2.31%) COBIT
11 4 (2.31%) QA
12 3 (1.73%) NIST 800
13 1 (0.58%) Cyber Essentials
13 1 (0.58%) PMO
13 1 (0.58%) PSD2
13 1 (0.58%) SLA
13 1 (0.58%) SOC 1
System Software
1 22 (12.72%) Active Directory
2 5 (2.89%) Docker
3 1 (0.58%) Apache ZooKeeper
Systems Management
1 10 (5.78%) Kubernetes
2 8 (4.62%) Single Sign-On
3 5 (2.89%) Ansible
3 5 (2.89%) CASB
3 5 (2.89%) Progress Chef
4 1 (0.58%) Active Directory Federation Services
4 1 (0.58%) CA Wily
4 1 (0.58%) Grafana
4 1 (0.58%) Prometheus
4 1 (0.58%) Puppet
4 1 (0.58%) systemd
Vendors
1 54 (31.21%) SAP
2 32 (18.50%) Microsoft
3 21 (12.14%) ServiceNow
4 17 (9.83%) Oracle
5 16 (9.25%) CyberArk
6 12 (6.94%) Workday
7 9 (5.20%) Splunk
8 8 (4.62%) Salesforce
9 5 (2.89%) Ariba
9 5 (2.89%) Cribl.io
9 5 (2.89%) Okta
10 4 (2.31%) ForgeRock
10 4 (2.31%) Google
10 4 (2.31%) Hyperion
10 4 (2.31%) Tagetik
11 3 (1.73%) Alteryx
11 3 (1.73%) Bloomberg
11 3 (1.73%) Databricks
11 3 (1.73%) Palo Alto
11 3 (1.73%) Zscaler