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 27 January 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

 6 months to
27 Jan 2026		 Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 213 196 155
Rank change year-on-year -17 -41 +24
Contract jobs citing SLA 479 420 696
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 1.26% 1.35% 1.57%
As % of the Quality Assurance & Compliance category 7.35% 9.37% 10.92%
Number of daily rates quoted 248 219 344
10th Percentile £172 £146 £148
25th Percentile £259 £185 £184
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £405 £250 £366
Median % change year-on-year +62.00% -31.69% +22.00%
75th Percentile £524 £499 £519
90th Percentile £625 £588 £635
UK excluding London median daily rate £338 £250 £300
% change year-on-year +35.00% -16.67% +33.33%
Number of hourly rates quoted 122 41 68
10th Percentile £16.04 £14.70 £12.75
25th Percentile £17.69 £18.10 £13.29
Median hourly rate £18.50 £24.18 £17.04
Median % change year-on-year -23.49% +41.92% -3.25%
75th Percentile £20.35 £25.00 £30.63
90th Percentile £33.03 £33.75 £55.01
UK excluding London median hourly rate £18.50 £24.18 £14.16
% change year-on-year -23.49% +70.76% -17.76%

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 6,518 4,482 6,375
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 17.12% 14.41% 14.36%
Number of daily rates quoted 4,188 2,624 4,239
10th Percentile £321 £250 £300
25th Percentile £413 £375 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £500 £525
Median % change year-on-year - -4.76% -
75th Percentile £600 £625 £638
90th Percentile £700 £725 £750
UK excluding London median daily rate £495 £475 £500
% change year-on-year +4.21% -5.00% +5.26%
Number of hourly rates quoted 326 174 310
10th Percentile £15.31 £15.00 £12.25
25th Percentile £18.16 £21.01 £14.55
Median hourly rate £26.34 £29.00 £28.30
Median % change year-on-year -9.17% +2.47% +9.65%
75th Percentile £63.75 £65.00 £55.80
90th Percentile £70.00 £75.00 £76.53
UK excluding London median hourly rate £26.27 £28.00 £27.50
% change year-on-year -6.18% +1.82% +12.24%

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 27 January 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 27 January 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 27 January 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 -28 431 £400 +60.00% 237
UK excluding London -29 337 £338 +35.00% 228
London -3 113 £475 +97.92% 57
East of England +40 100 £473 +110.00% 34
Work from Home -30 98 £454 +95.16% 50
South East -57 62 £410 +64.00% 83
North of England -62 58 £293 +11.43% 38
Midlands -67 47 £195 -13.33% 36
South West -5 45 £283 -48.64% 18
West Midlands -39 34 £198 -4.24% 19
North West -50 32 £300 -20.00% 21
Yorkshire -36 19 £365 +52.08% 12
Scotland +11 18 £355 +77.50% 18
East Midlands -34 13 £134 -61.71% 16
Northern Ireland -5 8 £500 +237.84% 2
North East -10 7 £265 +0.95% 5
Wales -3 3 £183 -16.82% 8

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 20 (4.18%) Microsoft Exchange
2 19 (3.97%) SharePoint
3 5 (1.04%) Confluence
4 4 (0.84%) Oracle Workflow
5 2 (0.42%) IIS
5 2 (0.42%) Tomcat
6 1 (0.21%) ArcGIS
6 1 (0.21%) GeoServer
6 1 (0.21%) Oracle Spatial
6 1 (0.21%) WebSphere
6 1 (0.21%) WebSphere Application Server
Applications
1 44 (9.19%) Microsoft Excel
2 43 (8.98%) Spreadsheet
3 34 (7.10%) Microsoft Office
4 4 (0.84%) MS Visio
4 4 (0.84%) Oracle Smart View
5 3 (0.63%) Microsoft PowerPoint
6 2 (0.42%) Microsoft Project
Business Applications
1 15 (3.13%) Oracle EBS
1 15 (3.13%) Oracle Subledger Accounting
2 10 (2.09%) Oracle Payables
3 9 (1.88%) Remedy ITSM
4 8 (1.67%) Oracle Assets
4 8 (1.67%) Oracle General Ledger
5 6 (1.25%) Oracle Receivables
6 5 (1.04%) Oracle FAH
7 4 (0.84%) Oracle EBS R12
7 4 (0.84%) Oracle ERP
8 3 (0.63%) Oracle Financials
9 2 (0.42%) Dynamics CRM
9 2 (0.42%) Dynamics GP
9 2 (0.42%) Oracle Cash Management
9 2 (0.42%) Oracle E-Business Tax
9 2 (0.42%) Temenos T24
9 2 (0.42%) Workday HCM
10 1 (0.21%) iTrent
10 1 (0.21%) SAP Payroll
10 1 (0.21%) Veritas eDiscovery
Cloud Services
1 64 (13.36%) Microsoft 365
2 47 (9.81%) Azure
3 31 (6.47%) AWS
4 16 (3.34%) GCP
5 13 (2.71%) Entra ID
6 8 (1.67%) IaaS
6 8 (1.67%) PaaS
6 8 (1.67%) Power Platform
6 8 (1.67%) SaaS
7 7 (1.46%) GitHub
7 7 (1.46%) OCI
8 5 (1.04%) Azure DevOps
8 5 (1.04%) GitHub Actions
8 5 (1.04%) OpenShift
9 4 (0.84%) Cloud Computing
10 3 (0.63%) AWS CloudFormation
10 3 (0.63%) AWS KMS
10 3 (0.63%) OneDrive
10 3 (0.63%) Virtual Private Cloud
11 2 (0.42%) Azure Key Vault
Communications & Networking
1 24 (5.01%) Firewall
2 23 (4.80%) WAN
3 20 (4.18%) DNS
4 15 (3.13%) SD-WAN
5 14 (2.92%) VPN
6 13 (2.71%) DHCP
6 13 (2.71%) PABX
7 12 (2.51%) MPLS
8 10 (2.09%) LAN
8 10 (2.09%) Wireless
9 8 (1.67%) TCP/IP
10 7 (1.46%) BGP
10 7 (1.46%) Cisco ASA
10 7 (1.46%) OSPF
11 6 (1.25%) Broadband
11 6 (1.25%) Network Security
11 6 (1.25%) SDH
11 6 (1.25%) VLAN
12 5 (1.04%) Cisco IOS
12 5 (1.04%) SAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 10 (2.09%) SQL Server
2 7 (1.46%) Oracle Database
2 7 (1.46%) PostgreSQL
3 6 (1.25%) MongoDB
3 6 (1.25%) Power BI
4 5 (1.04%) MySQL
5 4 (0.84%) Relational Database
6 3 (0.63%) Amazon RDS
6 3 (0.63%) SAP HANA
7 2 (0.42%) GIS
7 2 (0.42%) Oracle Reports
7 2 (0.42%) SQL Server Integration Services
8 1 (0.21%) Amazon Aurora
8 1 (0.21%) Azure SQL Database
8 1 (0.21%) Data Warehouse
8 1 (0.21%) Metadata
8 1 (0.21%) Oracle Database 12c
8 1 (0.21%) SQL Server Reporting Services
Development Applications
1 18 (3.76%) JIRA
2 15 (3.13%) Git
2 15 (3.13%) Jenkins
3 14 (2.92%) GitLab
4 5 (1.04%) Visual Studio
5 3 (0.63%) CircleCI
5 3 (0.63%) Postman
6 2 (0.42%) Jaeger
6 2 (0.42%) PVCS
7 1 (0.21%) Cucumber
7 1 (0.21%) JMeter
7 1 (0.21%) Metasploit
7 1 (0.21%) Selenium
7 1 (0.21%) TestDirector
General
1 223 (46.56%) Social Skills
2 97 (20.25%) Finance
3 59 (12.32%) Analytical Skills
4 54 (11.27%) Public Sector
5 33 (6.89%) Telecoms
6 31 (6.47%) Organisational Skills
7 29 (6.05%) Banking
8 23 (4.80%) Legal
9 22 (4.59%) Documentation Skills
10 13 (2.71%) Retail
11 8 (1.67%) Aerospace
11 8 (1.67%) Financial Institution
11 8 (1.67%) Law
12 7 (1.46%) Investment Banking
12 7 (1.46%) Manufacturing
12 7 (1.46%) Marketing
13 5 (1.04%) General Ledger
13 5 (1.04%) Local Government
14 4 (0.84%) Influencing Skills
14 4 (0.84%) Presentation Skills
Job Titles
1 79 (16.49%) IT Support
2 61 (12.73%) Analyst
3 49 (10.23%) Lead
4 35 (7.31%) Administrator
4 35 (7.31%) Desktop Support
5 31 (6.47%) Support Engineer
6 28 (5.85%) Technical Support
7 24 (5.01%) Service Analyst
7 24 (5.01%) Support Analyst
8 23 (4.80%) Service Manager
9 21 (4.38%) Team Leader
10 19 (3.97%) Consultant
10 19 (3.97%) Senior
11 17 (3.55%) Desktop Engineer
11 17 (3.55%) IT Administrator
11 17 (3.55%) Service Desk Analyst
12 16 (3.34%) IT Manager
13 14 (2.92%) Developer
14 13 (2.71%) Desktop Support Engineer
14 13 (2.71%) IT Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 11 (2.30%) Middleware
2 9 (1.88%) Oracle Fusion
3 7 (1.46%) LDAP
4 5 (1.04%) Kafka
4 5 (1.04%) REST
5 4 (0.84%) 802.1X
6 2 (0.42%) .NET
6 2 (0.42%) ARM Templates
6 2 (0.42%) CSS
6 2 (0.42%) Elastic Stack
6 2 (0.42%) Node.js
6 2 (0.42%) OAuth
6 2 (0.42%) OAuth2
6 2 (0.42%) OpenID
6 2 (0.42%) RESTful
6 2 (0.42%) SAML
6 2 (0.42%) Universal Windows Platform
6 2 (0.42%) Web Services
7 1 (0.21%) ADO
7 1 (0.21%) ASP.NET
Miscellaneous
1 31 (6.47%) Management Information System
2 27 (5.64%) Onboarding
3 20 (4.18%) Data Centre
3 20 (4.18%) Self-Motivation
4 15 (3.13%) Driving Licence
4 15 (3.13%) Smartphone
5 13 (2.71%) Product Ownership
6 8 (1.67%) Analytical Mindset
7 7 (1.46%) Public Cloud
8 6 (1.25%) Enterprise Cloud
9 5 (1.04%) Cloud Native
9 5 (1.04%) CMDB
9 5 (1.04%) Data Protection Act
9 5 (1.04%) Enterprise Software
9 5 (1.04%) Equities
9 5 (1.04%) NHS
10 4 (0.84%) Derivative
10 4 (0.84%) Distributed Systems
10 4 (0.84%) Equity Derivative
10 4 (0.84%) PKI
Operating Systems
1 96 (20.04%) Windows
2 34 (7.10%) Linux
3 33 (6.89%) Windows 10
4 19 (3.97%) Unix
5 16 (3.34%) Windows Server
6 15 (3.13%) Android
7 12 (2.51%) Apple iOS
8 9 (1.88%) Mac OS
9 7 (1.46%) CentOS
9 7 (1.46%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
10 3 (0.63%) Windows 7
11 2 (0.42%) Windows 8
11 2 (0.42%) Windows Server 2012
12 1 (0.21%) Mac OS X
12 1 (0.21%) Windows XP
Processes & Methodologies
1 143 (29.85%) ITIL
2 117 (24.43%) Customer Service
3 92 (19.21%) Service Delivery
4 76 (15.87%) Time Management
5 62 (12.94%) Continuous Improvement
6 58 (12.11%) ITSM
7 51 (10.65%) Problem-Solving
8 50 (10.44%) Stakeholder Management
9 49 (10.23%) Incident Management
10 46 (9.60%) Service Management
11 43 (8.98%) Change Management
12 39 (8.14%) Agile
13 35 (7.31%) Root Cause Analysis
14 34 (7.10%) Asset Management
15 28 (5.85%) Problem Management
15 28 (5.85%) Roadmaps
16 27 (5.64%) Customer Experience
17 26 (5.43%) DevOps
18 22 (4.59%) Disaster Recovery
19 21 (4.38%) CI/CD
Programming Languages
1 28 (5.85%) SQL
2 22 (4.59%) Python
3 21 (4.38%) Shell Script
4 16 (3.34%) PowerShell
5 13 (2.71%) Java
6 7 (1.46%) MATLAB
7 5 (1.04%) Bash
7 5 (1.04%) PL/SQL
8 4 (0.84%) C++
9 3 (0.63%) Go
9 3 (0.63%) JavaScript
10 2 (0.42%) Kusto Query Language
11 1 (0.21%) Bicep
11 1 (0.21%) C#
11 1 (0.21%) T-SQL
11 1 (0.21%) VB
Qualifications
1 129 (26.93%) Security Cleared
2 105 (21.92%) SC Cleared
3 36 (7.52%) Degree
4 16 (3.34%) DV Cleared
5 13 (2.71%) BPSS Clearance
6 12 (2.51%) ITIL Certification
7 11 (2.30%) ITIL Foundation Certificate
7 11 (2.30%) MOS
8 7 (1.46%) Microsoft Certification
8 7 (1.46%) PMI Certification
9 4 (0.84%) DBS Check
9 4 (0.84%) PMP
10 3 (0.63%) Azure Certification
10 3 (0.63%) CCA
10 3 (0.63%) Numerate Degree
11 2 (0.42%) Cisco Certification
11 2 (0.42%) Computer Science Degree
11 2 (0.42%) HNC
11 2 (0.42%) MCP
11 2 (0.42%) MCSE
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 18 (3.76%) GDPR
2 16 (3.34%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 10 (2.09%) QA
4 8 (1.67%) Data Quality
5 7 (1.46%) Sarbanes-Oxley
6 5 (1.04%) NIST
6 5 (1.04%) PMO
7 4 (0.84%) PCI DSS
8 3 (0.63%) COBIT
8 3 (0.63%) GRC
9 2 (0.42%) ISO/IEC 20000
9 2 (0.42%) NIST 800
9 2 (0.42%) PSD2
10 1 (0.21%) Cyber Essentials
10 1 (0.21%) ISO 9001
10 1 (0.21%) ISO/IEC 42001
System Software
1 50 (10.44%) Active Directory
2 9 (1.88%) Docker
2 9 (1.88%) VMware Infrastructure
3 6 (1.25%) vSphere
4 4 (0.84%) Firmware
4 4 (0.84%) Hyper-V
5 3 (0.63%) DFS Replication
5 3 (0.63%) Virtual Machines
6 2 (0.42%) BitLocker
6 2 (0.42%) VMware ESXi
7 1 (0.21%) Oracle RAC
Systems Management
1 16 (3.34%) Ansible
2 15 (3.13%) SCCM
3 14 (2.92%) Microsoft Intune
4 12 (2.51%) Kubernetes
5 10 (2.09%) Terraform
6 9 (1.88%) Grafana
7 8 (1.67%) Single Sign-On
8 7 (1.46%) Check_MK
8 7 (1.46%) Podman
8 7 (1.46%) Red Hat Satellite
9 6 (1.25%) SCOM
9 6 (1.25%) ServiceCenter
10 4 (0.84%) Prometheus
10 4 (0.84%) TeamSite
11 3 (0.63%) Active Directory Federation Services
11 3 (0.63%) FortiGate
11 3 (0.63%) RSA Archer
11 3 (0.63%) WSUS
12 2 (0.42%) Jamf Pro
12 2 (0.42%) Puppet
Vendors
1 140 (29.23%) Microsoft
2 58 (12.11%) ServiceNow
3 45 (9.39%) Oracle
4 31 (6.47%) Cisco
5 27 (5.64%) HP
6 25 (5.22%) SAP
7 24 (5.01%) Dell
8 21 (4.38%) VMware
9 18 (3.76%) Apple
10 14 (2.92%) Remedy
11 9 (1.88%) Splunk
12 8 (1.67%) IBM
13 7 (1.46%) Fortinet
13 7 (1.46%) Red Hat
13 7 (1.46%) Workday
14 5 (1.04%) Nokia
14 5 (1.04%) Trend Micro
15 4 (0.84%) BMC
15 4 (0.84%) Juniper
15 4 (0.84%) Zscaler
269 SLA jobs Nationwide