Job Vacancy Trend Daily Rate Trend Daily Rate Histogram Hourly Rate Trend Hourly Rate Histogram Job Locations Skill Sets
Period
to 17 April 2021

The following table provides summary statistics for contract job vacancies with a requirement for SLA skills. Included is a benchmarking guide to the contractor rates offered in vacancies that have cited SLA over the 6 months to 17 April 2021 with a comparison to the same period in the previous 2 years.

Note that daily and hourly rates are treated separately in these statistics. When calculating contractor rate percentiles, daily rates are never derived from quoted hourly rates or vice versa.

Service Level Agreement (SLA)
UK
6 months to
17 Apr 2021		 Same period 2020 Same period 2019
Rank 191 168 219
Rank change year-on-year -23 +51 -13
Contract jobs citing SLA 704 913 1,273
As % of all contract jobs advertised in the UK 1.33% 1.57% 1.33%
As % of the Quality Assurance & Compliance category 12.05% 15.45% 12.33%
Number of daily rates quoted 387 504 702
10th Percentile £130 £115 £113
25th Percentile £184 £156 £164
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £375 £325 £309
Median % change year-on-year +15.38% +5.26% +8.24%
75th Percentile £485 £450 £450
90th Percentile £575 £539 £538
UK excluding London median daily rate £324 £275 £275
% change year-on-year +17.95% - -
Number of hourly rates quoted 91 82 148
10th Percentile £10.35 £11.28 £9.98
25th Percentile £11.36 £14.31 £11.50
Median hourly rate £14.00 £18.00 £14.78
Median % change year-on-year -22.22% +21.83% -3.07%
75th Percentile £17.00 £20.29 £18.00
90th Percentile £22.00 £34.54 £25.83
UK excluding London median hourly rate £13.70 £16.75 £13.25
% change year-on-year -18.24% +26.42% -13.06%

SLA is in the Quality Assurance and Compliance category. The following table is for comparison with the above and provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies with a requirement for quality assurance or compliance skills.

All Quality Assurance and Compliance Skills
UK
Contract vacancies with a requirement for quality assurance or compliance skills 5,842 5,911 10,328
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 11.00% 10.19% 10.76%
Number of daily rates quoted 3,904 3,741 6,573
10th Percentile £263 £225 £250
25th Percentile £363 £350 £350
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £475 £450 £450
Median % change year-on-year +5.56% - -
75th Percentile £575 £556 £556
90th Percentile £656 £638 £650
UK excluding London median daily rate £425 £425 £425
Number of hourly rates quoted 271 261 340
10th Percentile £11.36 £13.50 £10.75
25th Percentile £14.25 £17.27 £13.19
Median hourly rate £21.00 £22.50 £20.25
Median % change year-on-year -6.67% +11.14% -5.84%
75th Percentile £40.00 £46.50 £39.00
90th Percentile £52.50 £52.25 £48.75
UK excluding London median hourly rate £21.00 £21.50 £20.00
% change year-on-year -2.33% +7.50% -7.96%

SLA
Job Vacancy Trend

Job postings citing SLA as a proportion of all IT jobs advertised.

Job vacancy trend for SLA in the UK

SLA
Contractor Daily Rate Trend

3-month moving average daily rate quoted in jobs citing SLA.

Daily rate trend for SLA in the UK

SLA
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing SLA over the 6 months to 17 April 2021.

Daily rate histogram for SLA in the UK

SLA
Contractor Hourly Rate Trend

3-month moving average hourly rates quoted in jobs citing SLA.

Hourly rate trend for SLA in the UK

SLA
Hourly Rate Histogram

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing SLA over the 6 months to 17 April 2021.

Hourly rate histogram for SLA in the UK

SLA
Top 17 Contract 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 17 April 2021. 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
Job
Vacancies
England -15 622 £375 +14.50% 227
UK excluding London +3 426 £324 +17.95% 188
London -28 206 £420 +5.00% 52
Work from Home -134 142 £400 -12.09% 33
South East +19 130 £425 +38.21% 50
North of England -4 99 £220 +10.00% 40
East of England +49 65 £220 -27.27% 17
Midlands +9 63 £225 -35.71% 44
North West -18 57 £220 +3.53% 19
West Midlands +5 39 £300 -29.41% 26
Yorkshire +21 34 £175 - 12
South West +18 31 £400 +45.45% 23
Scotland -5 28 £350 +20.69% 8
East Midlands +20 24 £129 +45.98% 18
North East +36 8 £340 +65.85% 9
Wales +16 8 £476 +20.95% 4
Northern Ireland +8 2 - - 2

For the 6 months to 17 April 2021, IT contractor jobs citing SLA also mentioned the following skills in order of popularity. The figures indicate the absolute number co-occurrences and as a proportion of all contract job ads with a requirement for SLA.

1 223 (31.68%) Windows
2 211 (29.97%) ITIL
3 177 (25.14%) Active Directory
4 176 (25.00%) Microsoft
5 126 (17.90%) Finance
5 126 (17.90%) Microsoft 365
6 99 (14.06%) Agile Software Development
7 97 (13.78%) Service Delivery
8 96 (13.64%) Service Management
8 96 (13.64%) Problem-Solving
9 92 (13.07%) Cisco
10 90 (12.78%) Microsoft Office
11 86 (12.22%) Security Cleared
12 83 (11.79%) Azure
13 79 (11.22%) Windows 10
14 74 (10.51%) VMware
15 71 (10.09%) Telecoms
16 69 (9.80%) Migration
17 68 (9.66%) DevOps
18 65 (9.23%) ITSM
19 63 (8.95%) VMware Infrastructure
20 61 (8.66%) Windows Server
21 55 (7.81%) Analytical Skills
22 54 (7.67%) Stakeholder Management
23 51 (7.24%) Change Management
23 51 (7.24%) SQL
23 51 (7.24%) SharePoint
24 47 (6.68%) SC Cleared
25 46 (6.53%) HP
26 45 (6.39%) Linux

SLA
Co-occurring IT Skills by Category

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

Application Platforms
1 51 (7.24%) SharePoint
2 31 (4.40%) MS Exchange
3 15 (2.13%) Confluence
3 15 (2.13%) IIS
4 7 (0.99%) Exchange Server 2010
4 7 (0.99%) Oracle SOA Suite
4 7 (0.99%) SharePoint 2010
4 7 (0.99%) WebLogic
5 6 (0.85%) Red Hat Fuse
5 6 (0.85%) Skype for Business
6 4 (0.57%) Blackberry Enterprise Server
6 4 (0.57%) SharePoint 2013
7 3 (0.43%) Apache
7 3 (0.43%) Camunda
7 3 (0.43%) Exchange Server 2013
8 2 (0.28%) Exchange Server 2007
8 2 (0.28%) JBoss
8 2 (0.28%) OpenStack
8 2 (0.28%) SharePoint Server
8 2 (0.28%) Site Server
Applications
1 90 (12.78%) Microsoft Office
2 41 (5.82%) Microsoft Excel
3 17 (2.41%) MS Visio
4 7 (0.99%) InfoPath
5 3 (0.43%) Microsoft Project
6 2 (0.28%) Microsoft PowerPoint
Business Applications
1 11 (1.56%) Oracle Payables
2 10 (1.42%) Remedy ITSM
3 9 (1.28%) Oracle General Ledger
3 9 (1.28%) Oracle Receivables
3 9 (1.28%) Oracle Subledger Accounting
4 8 (1.14%) Oracle Applications
5 7 (0.99%) Oracle Assets
5 7 (0.99%) Oracle EBS
5 7 (0.99%) Oracle E-Business Tax
5 7 (0.99%) Oracle FAH
5 7 (0.99%) Oracle Financials
6 6 (0.85%) Oracle Internet Expenses
6 6 (0.85%) Oracle iProcurement
7 5 (0.71%) Dynamics CRM
8 4 (0.57%) Cerner Millennium
9 3 (0.43%) Oracle EBS R12
9 3 (0.43%) SAP S/4HANA
10 2 (0.28%) assyst
10 2 (0.28%) Orchard Housing
10 2 (0.28%) SAP SCM
Cloud Services
1 126 (17.90%) Microsoft 365
2 83 (11.79%) Azure
3 44 (6.25%) AWS
4 17 (2.41%) Power Platform
5 15 (2.13%) Azure Active Directory
6 13 (1.85%) OneDrive
7 12 (1.70%) IaaS
8 11 (1.56%) Virtual Private Cloud
9 10 (1.42%) GCP
10 7 (0.99%) PowerApps
11 6 (0.85%) OpenShift
11 6 (0.85%) SaaS
12 5 (0.71%) Azure ExpressRoute
12 5 (0.71%) Dynamics 365
12 5 (0.71%) PaaS
12 5 (0.71%) Power Automate
12 5 (0.71%) Serverless
13 4 (0.57%) Azure Functions
14 3 (0.43%) AWS Lambda
15 2 (0.28%) AWS Elastic Beanstalk
Communications & Networking
1 43 (6.11%) VPN
2 42 (5.97%) Firewall
3 41 (5.82%) DNS
4 32 (4.55%) DHCP
5 27 (3.84%) WAN
6 26 (3.69%) SAN
7 25 (3.55%) LAN
8 19 (2.70%) SSL
9 18 (2.56%) TCP/IP
10 15 (2.13%) Cisco Nexus
11 14 (1.99%) Skype
12 13 (1.85%) Internet
13 12 (1.70%) Cisco ASA
13 12 (1.70%) OSPF
14 11 (1.56%) BGP
14 11 (1.56%) MPLS
14 11 (1.56%) Network Security
14 11 (1.56%) VoIP
14 11 (1.56%) Wi-Fi
15 10 (1.42%) Remote Desktop
Database & Business Intelligence
1 18 (2.56%) SQL Server
2 14 (1.99%) Hadoop
3 13 (1.85%) Big Data
3 13 (1.85%) Oracle Database
3 13 (1.85%) Oracle Database 12c
4 12 (1.70%) Oracle BI EE
5 10 (1.42%) Power BI
6 7 (0.99%) Oracle Database 11g
6 7 (0.99%) Oracle Reports
7 6 (0.85%) Oracle ODI
7 6 (0.85%) SAP HANA
8 5 (0.71%) Oracle Exadata
8 5 (0.71%) SAP BW
8 5 (0.71%) SQL Server Reporting Services
9 4 (0.57%) Azure SQL Database
10 3 (0.43%) Amazon RDS
10 3 (0.43%) Electronic Patient Records
10 3 (0.43%) NoSQL
10 3 (0.43%) Oracle Database 10g
10 3 (0.43%) SQL Server Integration Services
Development Applications
1 35 (4.97%) JIRA
2 9 (1.28%) JMeter
3 8 (1.14%) LoadRunner
3 8 (1.14%) NeoLoad
3 8 (1.14%) SilkPerformer
3 8 (1.14%) WebLOAD
4 7 (0.99%) Jenkins
5 6 (0.85%) Git (software)
6 4 (0.57%) GitLab
6 4 (0.57%) Sonatype Nexus
7 2 (0.28%) Visual Studio
8 1 (0.14%) Bitbucket Server
8 1 (0.14%) FishEye
8 1 (0.14%) GCC
8 1 (0.14%) Hudson
8 1 (0.14%) Mockito
8 1 (0.14%) ScriptRunner
8 1 (0.14%) SoapUI
8 1 (0.14%) VSS/SourceSafe
8 1 (0.14%) Zephyr
General
1 126 (17.90%) Finance
2 71 (10.09%) Telecoms
3 44 (6.25%) Public Sector
4 32 (4.55%) Banking
5 15 (2.13%) Retail
6 13 (1.85%) Legal
7 12 (1.70%) Manufacturing
8 10 (1.42%) Marketing
9 7 (0.99%) Billing
9 7 (0.99%) Electronics
9 7 (0.99%) Investment Banking
10 4 (0.57%) Law
11 3 (0.43%) Automotive
11 3 (0.43%) Back Office
11 3 (0.43%) Digital Economy
11 3 (0.43%) Front Office
11 3 (0.43%) Local Government
12 2 (0.28%) Aerospace
12 2 (0.28%) Pharmaceutical
12 2 (0.28%) Swedish Language
Job Titles
1 139 (19.74%) Analyst
2 62 (8.81%) Service Analyst
3 53 (7.53%) Service Desk Analyst
4 50 (7.10%) Support Engineer
5 43 (6.11%) Service Manager
6 38 (5.40%) 1st Line Support
6 38 (5.40%) IT Support
7 36 (5.11%) Administrator
8 33 (4.69%) Consultant
9 32 (4.55%) IT Analyst
9 32 (4.55%) Network Engineer
10 29 (4.12%) Support Analyst
11 25 (3.55%) Service Desk Support
12 23 (3.27%) Architect
13 22 (3.13%) 2nd Line Support
13 22 (3.13%) Delivery Manager
13 22 (3.13%) Developer
14 20 (2.84%) VMware Engineer
15 19 (2.70%) DBA
16 18 (2.56%) IT Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 13 (1.85%) Kafka
2 11 (1.56%) CSS
2 11 (1.56%) XML
3 10 (1.42%) .NET
3 10 (1.42%) HTML
4 9 (1.28%) 802.1X
5 8 (1.14%) Oracle GoldenGate
6 5 (0.71%) Elastic Stack
6 5 (0.71%) Express
6 5 (0.71%) Node.js
6 5 (0.71%) SAP ALE
6 5 (0.71%) SAP XI
6 5 (0.71%) Web Services
7 4 (0.57%) REST
8 3 (0.43%) AngularJS
8 3 (0.43%) jQuery
8 3 (0.43%) JSON
8 3 (0.43%) SAML
8 3 (0.43%) SOAP
8 3 (0.43%) XSLT
Miscellaneous
1 55 (7.81%) Analytical Skills
2 32 (4.55%) Management Information System
3 29 (4.12%) Data Centre
4 28 (3.98%) NHS
5 27 (3.84%) Self-Motivation
6 14 (1.99%) CMDB
7 13 (1.85%) Replication
7 13 (1.85%) Video Conferencing
8 9 (1.28%) PKI
9 8 (1.14%) Smart Meter
10 7 (0.99%) Cyberattack
10 7 (0.99%) Enterprise Software
10 7 (0.99%) Fixed Income
11 6 (0.85%) Blackberry
11 6 (0.85%) Equities
12 5 (0.71%) Cloud Native
12 5 (0.71%) Clustering
12 5 (0.71%) Cyberthreat
12 5 (0.71%) HP Storage
13 4 (0.57%) Thin Client
Operating Systems
1 223 (31.68%) Windows
2 79 (11.22%) Windows 10
3 61 (8.66%) Windows Server
4 45 (6.39%) Linux
5 31 (4.40%) Windows 7
6 26 (3.69%) Windows Server 2012
7 24 (3.41%) Unix
8 18 (2.56%) Windows Server 2016
9 16 (2.27%) Mac OS
9 16 (2.27%) Windows Server 2008
10 13 (1.85%) Windows Server 2019
11 10 (1.42%) Android
11 10 (1.42%) Apple iOS
12 6 (0.85%) Windows Server 2003
13 5 (0.71%) AIX
13 5 (0.71%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
13 5 (0.71%) Ubuntu
14 2 (0.28%) CentOS
14 2 (0.28%) Oracle Linux
14 2 (0.28%) Windows 8
Processes & Methodologies
1 211 (29.97%) ITIL
2 99 (14.06%) Agile Software Development
3 97 (13.78%) Service Delivery
4 96 (13.64%) Problem-Solving
4 96 (13.64%) Service Management
5 69 (9.80%) Migration
6 68 (9.66%) DevOps
7 65 (9.23%) ITSM
8 54 (7.67%) Stakeholder Management
9 51 (7.24%) Change Management
10 42 (5.97%) Disaster Recovery
11 41 (5.82%) Incident Management
12 36 (5.11%) Project Management
13 35 (4.97%) Project Delivery
14 31 (4.40%) Cybersecurity
14 31 (4.40%) Problem Management
14 31 (4.40%) Scrum
15 30 (4.26%) Continuous Improvement
16 28 (3.98%) Time Management
17 26 (3.69%) Configuration Management
Programming Languages
1 51 (7.24%) SQL
2 43 (6.11%) PowerShell
3 32 (4.55%) Java
4 25 (3.55%) Python
5 24 (3.41%) VB
6 14 (1.99%) C
6 14 (1.99%) JavaScript
7 9 (1.28%) C#
7 9 (1.28%) PL/SQL
8 5 (0.71%) Shell Script
9 4 (0.57%) PHP
10 3 (0.43%) Bash Shell
10 3 (0.43%) T-SQL
10 3 (0.43%) VBScript
11 2 (0.28%) Go
11 2 (0.28%) Ruby
11 2 (0.28%) Rust
11 2 (0.28%) Scala
12 1 (0.14%) AWK
12 1 (0.14%) Groovy
Qualifications
1 86 (12.22%) Security Cleared
2 47 (6.68%) SC Cleared
3 33 (4.69%) Degree
3 33 (4.69%) Microsoft Certification
4 29 (4.12%) Cisco Certification
5 25 (3.55%) ITIL Certification
6 21 (2.98%) DV Cleared
7 20 (2.84%) MCSE
8 19 (2.70%) ITIL Foundation Certificate
9 18 (2.56%) CCNA
10 16 (2.27%) CCNP
10 16 (2.27%) DBS Check
11 9 (1.28%) ISEB
11 9 (1.28%) ISTQB
12 8 (1.14%) Citrix Certification
12 8 (1.14%) ISTQB Foundation Certification
12 8 (1.14%) MCP
13 7 (0.99%) CCA
14 6 (0.85%) MCITP
15 5 (0.71%) BPSS Clearance
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 22 (3.13%) QA
2 18 (2.56%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 10 (1.42%) GDPR
4 7 (0.99%) Data Quality
4 7 (0.99%) ISO/IEC 20000
5 4 (0.57%) Disclosure Scotland
5 4 (0.57%) HL7
6 3 (0.43%) ISO 9001
6 3 (0.43%) PMO
6 3 (0.43%) Sarbanes-Oxley
7 2 (0.28%) COBIT
7 2 (0.28%) EMIR
7 2 (0.28%) MiFID
7 2 (0.28%) PCI DSS
8 1 (0.14%) BS25999
8 1 (0.14%) GxP
8 1 (0.14%) NIST
8 1 (0.14%) NIST 800
System Software
1 177 (25.14%) Active Directory
2 63 (8.95%) VMware Infrastructure
3 22 (3.13%) Docker
4 13 (1.85%) Hyper-V
4 13 (1.85%) VMware NSX
5 12 (1.70%) Oracle RAC
6 11 (1.56%) VMware ESXi
6 11 (1.56%) vSphere
7 10 (1.42%) Firmware
8 8 (1.14%) Terminal Services
9 7 (0.99%) Virtual Servers
10 6 (0.85%) Microsoft Virtual Server
10 6 (0.85%) Terminal Server
10 6 (0.85%) VMware Server
11 5 (0.71%) XenApp
11 5 (0.71%) XenDesktop
12 3 (0.43%) Veritas Cluster Server
12 3 (0.43%) Virtual Machines
13 2 (0.28%) BitLocker
13 2 (0.28%) Virtual Desktop
Systems Management
1 34 (4.83%) SCCM
2 22 (3.13%) Kubernetes
3 20 (2.84%) Microsoft Intune
4 16 (2.27%) Ansible
5 14 (1.99%) vRealize
6 13 (1.85%) SCOM
6 13 (1.85%) Terraform
7 10 (1.42%) AirWatch
7 10 (1.42%) NetBackup
8 8 (1.14%) HP ALM
8 8 (1.14%) Oracle RMAN
8 8 (1.14%) vCenter Server
9 7 (0.99%) Grafana
9 7 (0.99%) Prometheus
10 6 (0.85%) WSUS
11 5 (0.71%) Cisco CUCM
11 5 (0.71%) Data Guard
11 5 (0.71%) HP NNM
11 5 (0.71%) Nagios
12 4 (0.57%) Enterprise Manager Cloud Control
Vendors
1 176 (25.00%) Microsoft
2 92 (13.07%) Cisco
3 74 (10.51%) VMware
4 46 (6.53%) HP
5 41 (5.82%) Oracle
5 41 (5.82%) ServiceNow
6 39 (5.54%) Citrix
7 26 (3.69%) SAP
8 24 (3.41%) F5
9 20 (2.84%) Juniper
10 19 (2.70%) Dell
10 19 (2.70%) Remedy
11 18 (2.56%) Apple
12 17 (2.41%) Fortinet
12 17 (2.41%) Huawei
13 15 (2.13%) CheckPoint
14 14 (1.99%) Ericsson
14 14 (1.99%) Nokia
15 13 (1.85%) Nintex
16 12 (1.70%) NetApp
248 SLA job vacancies Nationwide