SLA Contract Job Trends

Service Level Agreement (SLA)
UK

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs requiring SLA skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 29 March 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

 6 months to
29 Mar 2026		 Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 220 191 131
Rank change year-on-year -29 -60 +51
Contract jobs citing SLA 541 406 772
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 1.21% 1.39% 1.74%
As % of the Quality Assurance & Compliance category 7.01% 9.07% 12.17%
Number of daily rates quoted 274 240 359
10th Percentile £200 £148 £150
25th Percentile £288 £189 £213
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £450 £250 £350
Median % change year-on-year +80.00% -28.57% +16.67%
75th Percentile £525 £495 £519
90th Percentile £600 £588 £600
UK excluding London median daily rate £424 £235 £285
% change year-on-year +80.59% -17.54% +23.91%
Number of hourly rates quoted 130 43 87
10th Percentile £16.23 £14.70 £11.07
25th Percentile £17.69 £17.95 £12.84
Median hourly rate £18.50 £22.14 £14.41
Median % change year-on-year -16.44% +53.64% -22.11%
75th Percentile £20.34 £24.42 £22.69
90th Percentile £26.11 £29.00 £32.60
UK excluding London median hourly rate £18.50 £22.14 £14.16
% change year-on-year -16.44% +56.36% -23.46%

All Quality Assurance and Compliance Skills
UK

SLA 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 7,718 4,475 6,342
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 17.32% 15.28% 14.33%
Number of daily rates quoted 4,972 2,899 4,037
10th Percentile £336 £263 £300
25th Percentile £413 £385 £405
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £500 £510
Median % change year-on-year - -1.96% -2.86%
75th Percentile £600 £619 £625
90th Percentile £700 £716 £744
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £475 £484
% change year-on-year +5.26% -1.86% +1.89%
Number of hourly rates quoted 420 177 373
10th Percentile £15.31 £17.26 £10.95
25th Percentile £18.50 £22.14 £13.25
Median hourly rate £30.58 £32.00 £21.64
Median % change year-on-year -4.44% +47.87% -44.51%
75th Percentile £65.00 £65.00 £45.00
90th Percentile £82.03 £80.40 £66.90
UK excluding London median hourly rate £31.43 £31.88 £18.00
% change year-on-year -1.41% +77.11% -48.57%

SLA
Job Vacancy Trend

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

SLA job vacancy trend in the UK

SLA
Daily Rate Trend

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing SLA.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing SLA

SLA
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing SLA over the 6 months to 29 March 2026.

Daily rate histogram for SLA in the UK

SLA
Hourly Rate Trend

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing SLA.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing SLA

SLA
Hourly Rate Histogram

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing SLA over the 6 months to 29 March 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for SLA in the UK

SLA
Top 17 Contract Job Locations

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing SLA within the UK over the 6 months to 29 March 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 -37 483 £450 +79.10% 233
UK excluding London -48 347 £424 +80.59% 191
London -2 163 £500 +49.25% 58
Work from Home 0 111 £475 +102.13% 81
East of England +34 108 £477 +111.78% 25
South East -60 74 £450 +80.36% 70
North of England -60 65 £365 +46.00% 48
Midlands -76 42 £296 +25.96% 28
North West -52 35 £438 +75.00% 34
West Midlands -65 30 £293 +24.68% 12
South West -36 28 £356 -35.27% 15
Scotland +16 27 £440 +133.11% 7
Yorkshire -53 23 £365 +82.50% 12
East Midlands -30 11 £534 +78.00% 16
North East - 7 £265 - 3
Northern Ireland -1 5 £500 +237.84% 2
Wales -13 1 - - 3

SLA
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 16 (2.96%) SharePoint
2 14 (2.59%) Microsoft Exchange
3 7 (1.29%) Confluence
4 5 (0.92%) Oracle Workflow
5 4 (0.74%) Adobe Experience Manager
6 3 (0.55%) Apache Airflow
6 3 (0.55%) ArcGIS
7 2 (0.37%) SAS
8 1 (0.18%) GeoServer
8 1 (0.18%) IIS
8 1 (0.18%) LiveCycle
8 1 (0.18%) OpenStack
8 1 (0.18%) Oracle Spatial
8 1 (0.18%) Smallworld
8 1 (0.18%) WebSphere
8 1 (0.18%) WebSphere Application Server
Applications
1 53 (9.80%) Microsoft Excel
2 46 (8.50%) Spreadsheet
3 32 (5.91%) Microsoft Office
4 6 (1.11%) MS Visio
5 5 (0.92%) Microsoft PowerPoint
6 1 (0.18%) Autodesk Inventor
6 1 (0.18%) MicroStation
6 1 (0.18%) Oracle Smart View
Business Applications
1 13 (2.40%) Oracle Subledger Accounting
1 13 (2.40%) Remedy ITSM
2 12 (2.22%) Oracle Payables
3 10 (1.85%) Oracle Assets
3 10 (1.85%) Oracle EBS
4 7 (1.29%) Oracle Receivables
5 6 (1.11%) Oracle ERP
6 5 (0.92%) Oracle General Ledger
7 3 (0.55%) Oracle Cash Management
8 2 (0.37%) Dynamics CRM
8 2 (0.37%) IntelliMatch
8 2 (0.37%) Oracle E-Business Tax
8 2 (0.37%) Payment Gateway
8 2 (0.37%) Temenos T24
9 1 (0.18%) OpenText VIM for SAP
9 1 (0.18%) Oracle EBS R12
9 1 (0.18%) Oracle FAH
9 1 (0.18%) Oracle Procure-to-Pay
9 1 (0.18%) SAP S/4HANA
9 1 (0.18%) Veritas eDiscovery
Cloud Services
1 61 (11.28%) Azure
2 53 (9.80%) Microsoft 365
3 45 (8.32%) AWS
4 20 (3.70%) Power Platform
5 17 (3.14%) GCP
6 15 (2.77%) IaaS
6 15 (2.77%) PaaS
7 13 (2.40%) SaaS
8 12 (2.22%) Virtual Private Cloud
9 11 (2.03%) Amazon EC2
9 11 (2.03%) Amazon S3
9 11 (2.03%) Datadog
10 10 (1.85%) Entra ID
11 9 (1.66%) AWS CloudFormation
11 9 (1.66%) Snowflake
12 8 (1.48%) Amazon CloudWatch
12 8 (1.48%) Azure DevOps
12 8 (1.48%) OCI
13 6 (1.11%) GitHub
14 5 (0.92%) OneDrive
Communications & Networking
1 31 (5.73%) Firewall
2 29 (5.36%) WAN
3 22 (4.07%) DNS
4 21 (3.88%) VPN
5 18 (3.33%) SD-WAN
6 17 (3.14%) LAN
7 16 (2.96%) DHCP
8 14 (2.59%) Network Security
8 14 (2.59%) Wi-Fi
9 13 (2.40%) SAN
10 12 (2.22%) Cisco ASA
10 12 (2.22%) MPLS
11 10 (1.85%) BGP
11 10 (1.85%) OSPF
11 10 (1.85%) VLAN
12 8 (1.48%) Cisco IOS
12 8 (1.48%) TCP/IP
13 7 (1.29%) Broadband
13 7 (1.29%) SDH
14 6 (1.11%) Wireless
Database & Business Intelligence
1 17 (3.14%) Power BI
1 17 (3.14%) SQL Server
2 11 (2.03%) Oracle Database
3 9 (1.66%) MySQL
4 7 (1.29%) PostgreSQL
5 5 (0.92%) MongoDB
5 5 (0.92%) Oracle Reports
5 5 (0.92%) Relational Database
6 4 (0.74%) GIS
6 4 (0.74%) Tableau
7 3 (0.55%) SAP HANA
8 2 (0.37%) Amazon RDS
8 2 (0.37%) Azure SQL Database
8 2 (0.37%) Pentaho
8 2 (0.37%) SQL Server Integration Services
9 1 (0.18%) Geospatial Data
9 1 (0.18%) Metadata
9 1 (0.18%) Oracle BI Publisher
9 1 (0.18%) Oracle Database 12c
9 1 (0.18%) Spatial Data
Development Applications
1 30 (5.55%) JIRA
2 17 (3.14%) Jenkins
3 16 (2.96%) GitLab
4 15 (2.77%) Git
5 7 (1.29%) Chocolatey
6 6 (1.11%) Visual Studio
7 4 (0.74%) Maven
8 3 (0.55%) CircleCI
9 2 (0.37%) JMeter
10 1 (0.18%) Bitbucket
10 1 (0.18%) Cucumber
10 1 (0.18%) Selenium
10 1 (0.18%) SQL Server Management Studio (SSMS)
10 1 (0.18%) WiX
General
1 253 (46.77%) Social Skills
2 111 (20.52%) Finance
3 74 (13.68%) Analytical Skills
4 50 (9.24%) Public Sector
5 38 (7.02%) Banking
6 33 (6.10%) Organisational Skills
7 31 (5.73%) Telecoms
8 22 (4.07%) Documentation Skills
9 19 (3.51%) Retail
10 18 (3.33%) Legal
11 10 (1.85%) Financial Institution
11 10 (1.85%) Investment Banking
11 10 (1.85%) Marketing
12 9 (1.66%) Billing
13 7 (1.29%) Aerospace
14 6 (1.11%) Law
14 6 (1.11%) Local Government
14 6 (1.11%) Presentation Skills
15 5 (0.92%) Inclusion and Diversity
15 5 (0.92%) Influencing Skills
Job Titles
1 76 (14.05%) IT Support
2 66 (12.20%) Analyst
3 46 (8.50%) Lead
4 42 (7.76%) Administrator
5 37 (6.84%) Senior
6 33 (6.10%) Service Manager
7 29 (5.36%) Technical Support
8 28 (5.18%) Support Engineer
9 27 (4.99%) Desktop Support
10 23 (4.25%) Service Analyst
11 21 (3.88%) IT Engineer
12 19 (3.51%) Consultant
13 18 (3.33%) Delivery Manager
14 16 (2.96%) IT Administrator
14 16 (2.96%) Service Delivery Manager
14 16 (2.96%) Support Analyst
14 16 (2.96%) Team Leader
15 14 (2.59%) Developer
16 13 (2.40%) Service Desk Analyst
17 12 (2.22%) DBA
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 16 (2.96%) Oracle Fusion
2 11 (2.03%) Middleware
3 9 (1.66%) REST
4 8 (1.48%) Web Services
5 7 (1.29%) LDAP
6 6 (1.11%) CSS
7 5 (0.92%) AWS CDK
7 5 (0.92%) jQuery
7 5 (0.92%) Spring
8 4 (0.74%) 802.1X
8 4 (0.74%) AngularJS
8 4 (0.74%) Bootstrap
8 4 (0.74%) J2EE
8 4 (0.74%) Kafka
8 4 (0.74%) Sass
8 4 (0.74%) Spring MVC
9 3 (0.55%) .NET
10 2 (0.37%) .NET Framework
10 2 (0.37%) ADO
10 2 (0.37%) SOAP
Miscellaneous
1 35 (6.47%) Onboarding
2 26 (4.81%) Management Information System
3 25 (4.62%) Data Centre
4 20 (3.70%) Product Ownership
5 16 (2.96%) Self-Motivation
6 13 (2.40%) Cloud Native
7 11 (2.03%) Data Protection Act
8 10 (1.85%) CMDB
8 10 (1.85%) Driving Licence
8 10 (1.85%) Enterprise Cloud
9 8 (1.48%) Smartphone
10 7 (1.29%) Cyber Threat
11 6 (1.11%) Enterprise Software
11 6 (1.11%) Equities
11 6 (1.11%) Public Cloud
12 5 (0.92%) IoT
12 5 (0.92%) Security Posture
13 4 (0.74%) Analytical Mindset
13 4 (0.74%) Distributed Systems
13 4 (0.74%) PropTech
Operating Systems
1 92 (17.01%) Windows
2 33 (6.10%) Linux
3 25 (4.62%) Windows 10
4 18 (3.33%) Unix
5 11 (2.03%) Windows Server
6 8 (1.48%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
7 7 (1.29%) CentOS
8 5 (0.92%) Android
8 5 (0.92%) Mac OS
9 3 (0.55%) Apple iOS
10 1 (0.18%) Mac OS X
10 1 (0.18%) Windows 7
10 1 (0.18%) Windows Server 2012
10 1 (0.18%) Windows XP
Processes & Methodologies
1 147 (27.17%) ITIL
2 105 (19.41%) Customer Service
3 94 (17.38%) Service Delivery
4 84 (15.53%) Continuous Improvement
5 82 (15.16%) Time Management
6 80 (14.79%) ITSM
7 73 (13.49%) Stakeholder Management
8 71 (13.12%) Problem-Solving
9 63 (11.65%) Incident Management
10 62 (11.46%) Agile
11 59 (10.91%) Change Management
12 58 (10.72%) Root Cause Analysis
13 50 (9.24%) Service Management
14 42 (7.76%) Roadmaps
15 41 (7.58%) Problem Management
16 36 (6.65%) Asset Management
16 36 (6.65%) CI/CD
16 36 (6.65%) Migration
17 33 (6.10%) Disaster Recovery
18 31 (5.73%) DevOps
Programming Languages
1 34 (6.28%) SQL
2 30 (5.55%) Python
3 18 (3.33%) Shell Script
4 17 (3.14%) PowerShell
5 14 (2.59%) Java
6 11 (2.03%) Bash
7 7 (1.29%) JavaScript
7 7 (1.29%) MATLAB
8 6 (1.11%) PL/SQL
9 4 (0.74%) C++
10 3 (0.55%) Go
11 2 (0.37%) VB
12 1 (0.18%) Apex Code
12 1 (0.18%) C#
12 1 (0.18%) Groovy
12 1 (0.18%) Korn
12 1 (0.18%) Scala
Qualifications
1 123 (22.74%) Security Cleared
2 98 (18.11%) SC Cleared
3 45 (8.32%) Degree
4 17 (3.14%) BPSS Clearance
5 13 (2.40%) DV Cleared
6 11 (2.03%) ITIL Certification
7 8 (1.48%) MOS
8 6 (1.11%) Microsoft Certification
9 5 (0.92%) Cisco Certification
9 5 (0.92%) ITIL Foundation Certificate
9 5 (0.92%) Master's Degree
10 4 (0.74%) Azure Certification
10 4 (0.74%) CCNP
10 4 (0.74%) CISA
10 4 (0.74%) PMI Certification
10 4 (0.74%) RIBA
11 3 (0.55%) CCA
11 3 (0.55%) CCSE
11 3 (0.55%) CISSP
11 3 (0.55%) MCSE
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 17 (3.14%) ISO/IEC 27001
2 15 (2.77%) PMO
3 14 (2.59%) GDPR
4 13 (2.40%) QA
5 12 (2.22%) Data Quality
6 9 (1.66%) NIST
7 7 (1.29%) GRC
8 6 (1.11%) PCI DSS
9 4 (0.74%) COBIT
9 4 (0.74%) Sarbanes-Oxley
10 3 (0.55%) Cyber Essentials
10 3 (0.55%) ISO/IEC 20000
11 2 (0.37%) ISO 20022
11 2 (0.37%) ISO 31000
11 2 (0.37%) ISO 8583
11 2 (0.37%) NIST 800
11 2 (0.37%) SOC 2
12 1 (0.18%) ISO 9001
12 1 (0.18%) ISO/IEC 42001
System Software
1 50 (9.24%) Active Directory
2 12 (2.22%) Docker
3 10 (1.85%) VMware Infrastructure
3 10 (1.85%) vSphere
4 6 (1.11%) VMware ESXi
5 3 (0.55%) DFS Replication
5 3 (0.55%) Virtual Desktop
6 2 (0.37%) Firmware
6 2 (0.37%) Hyper-V
7 1 (0.18%) BitLocker
7 1 (0.18%) Ceph
7 1 (0.18%) Oracle RAC
7 1 (0.18%) Virtual Servers
7 1 (0.18%) XenDesktop
Systems Management
1 25 (4.62%) SCCM
2 20 (3.70%) Microsoft Intune
3 19 (3.51%) Terraform
4 17 (3.14%) Ansible
5 12 (2.22%) ServiceCenter
6 9 (1.66%) Grafana
6 9 (1.66%) Kubernetes
7 7 (1.29%) Check_MK
7 7 (1.29%) Podman
7 7 (1.29%) Red Hat Satellite
7 7 (1.29%) Single Sign-On
8 6 (1.11%) FortiGate
9 4 (0.74%) Active Directory Federation Services
9 4 (0.74%) Prometheus
9 4 (0.74%) TeamSite
9 4 (0.74%) vCenter Server
10 2 (0.37%) HP ALM
10 2 (0.37%) HP Quality Center
10 2 (0.37%) RSA Archer
10 2 (0.37%) SCOM
Vendors
1 156 (28.84%) Microsoft
2 74 (13.68%) ServiceNow
3 54 (9.98%) Oracle
4 32 (5.91%) Cisco
5 30 (5.55%) HP
5 30 (5.55%) VMware
6 28 (5.18%) SAP
7 25 (4.62%) Dell
8 18 (3.33%) Apple
9 17 (3.14%) Remedy
10 14 (2.59%) Splunk
11 11 (2.03%) IBM
12 10 (1.85%) AppDynamics
12 10 (1.85%) Fortinet
12 10 (1.85%) Tenable
13 9 (1.66%) Zscaler
14 8 (1.48%) Red Hat
15 7 (1.29%) Dynatrace
16 5 (0.92%) Atlassian
16 5 (0.92%) Databricks
255 SLA jobs Nationwide