SLA Contract Job Trends in the West Midlands

Service Level Agreement (SLA)
England > West Midlands

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs advertised in the West Midlands requiring SLA skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 14 March 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
14 Mar 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 126 50 67
Rank change year-on-year -76 +17 +11
Contract jobs citing SLA 32 45 47
As % of all contract jobs in the West Midlands 1.13% 3.39% 2.42%
As % of the Quality Assurance & Compliance category 7.13% 19.48% 14.78%
Number of daily rates quoted 20 30 22
10th Percentile £159 £158 £189
25th Percentile £195 £196 £202
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £293 £235 £273
Median % change year-on-year +24.68% -13.76% -6.03%
75th Percentile £365 £444 £435
90th Percentile £475 £489 £583
England median daily rate £443 £250 £350
% change year-on-year +77.00% -28.57% +27.27%
Number of hourly rates quoted 3 8 10
10th Percentile - - £11.89
25th Percentile - - £13.00
Median hourly rate £16.00 £14.70 £13.18
Median % change year-on-year +8.84% +11.53% -20.12%
75th Percentile £16.05 £18.28 £13.75
90th Percentile £16.08 £30.43 £14.00
England median hourly rate £18.50 £22.14 £15.40
% change year-on-year -16.44% +43.77% -16.76%

All Quality Assurance and Compliance Skills
West Midlands

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 in the West Midlands.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for quality assurance or compliance skills 449 231 318
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the West Midlands 15.81% 17.42% 16.37%
Number of daily rates quoted 284 160 229
10th Percentile £306 £195 £260
25th Percentile £400 £313 £405
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £475 £500
Median % change year-on-year +5.26% -5.00% +3.91%
75th Percentile £575 £538 £600
90th Percentile £676 £639 £775
England median daily rate £510 £500 £525
% change year-on-year +2.00% -4.76% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 15 11 25
10th Percentile £12.63 - £11.44
25th Percentile - - £13.18
Median hourly rate £13.20 £14.70 £14.00
Median % change year-on-year -10.20% +5.00% -15.15%
75th Percentile £18.30 £30.38 £34.50
90th Percentile £20.50 £33.75 £58.75
England median hourly rate £26.11 £32.50 £25.00
% change year-on-year -19.66% +30.00% -37.50%

SLA
Job Vacancy Trend in the West Midlands

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

SLA job vacancy trend in the West Midlands

SLA
Daily Rate Trend in the West Midlands

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

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the West Midlands citing SLA

SLA
Daily Rate Histogram in the West Midlands

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing SLA in the West Midlands over the 6 months to 14 March 2026.

Daily rate histogram for SLA in the West Midlands

SLA
Hourly Rate Trend in the West Midlands

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

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the West Midlands citing SLA

SLA
Contract Job Locations in the West Midlands

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing SLA within the West Midlands region over the 6 months to 14 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
Birmingham -27 10 £365 +100.00% 6
Warwickshire -28 10 £195 -17.02% 1
Shropshire -41 7 £290 - 3
Coventry -25 1 - - 1
SLA
England

SLA
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in the West Midlands 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 4 (12.50%) SharePoint
2 2 (6.25%) SAS
3 1 (3.13%) LiveCycle
3 1 (3.13%) Microsoft Exchange
Applications
1 9 (28.13%) Microsoft Excel
2 7 (21.88%) Microsoft Office
3 2 (6.25%) Microsoft PowerPoint
Cloud Services
1 5 (15.63%) Microsoft 365
2 4 (12.50%) Power Platform
3 2 (6.25%) AWS
3 2 (6.25%) Azure
3 2 (6.25%) Azure DevOps
3 2 (6.25%) OneDrive
4 1 (3.13%) Matillion
4 1 (3.13%) Power Automate
4 1 (3.13%) PowerApps
4 1 (3.13%) Snowflake
Communications & Networking
1 3 (9.38%) VPN
2 2 (6.25%) Wi-Fi
3 1 (3.13%) DHCP
3 1 (3.13%) DNS
3 1 (3.13%) LAN
3 1 (3.13%) Radio Access Network
3 1 (3.13%) SD-WAN
3 1 (3.13%) TCP/IP
3 1 (3.13%) WAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 3 (9.38%) MySQL
1 3 (9.38%) Oracle Database
2 2 (6.25%) Pentaho
2 2 (6.25%) Relational Database
3 1 (3.13%) Data Warehouse
3 1 (3.13%) Power BI
3 1 (3.13%) SQL Server Integration Services
3 1 (3.13%) Tableau
Development Applications
1 4 (12.50%) JIRA
2 2 (6.25%) JMeter
3 1 (3.13%) Git
3 1 (3.13%) Jenkins
3 1 (3.13%) Selenium
General
1 13 (40.63%) Social Skills
2 9 (28.13%) Finance
3 8 (25.00%) Analytical Skills
4 3 (9.38%) Telecoms
5 2 (6.25%) Inclusion and Diversity
5 2 (6.25%) Law
5 2 (6.25%) Public Sector
6 1 (3.13%) Billing
6 1 (3.13%) Legal
6 1 (3.13%) Organisational Skills
Job Titles
1 8 (25.00%) Lead
2 4 (12.50%) Data Steward
3 3 (9.38%) Data Engineer
3 3 (9.38%) DBA
3 3 (9.38%) Oracle DBA
4 2 (6.25%) Desktop Engineer
4 2 (6.25%) Developer
4 2 (6.25%) Service Desk Engineer
4 2 (6.25%) Technical Leader
4 2 (6.25%) Test Leader
5 1 (3.13%) Analyst
5 1 (3.13%) AWS Engineer
5 1 (3.13%) Consultant
5 1 (3.13%) DevOps Manager
5 1 (3.13%) Field Telecoms Engineer
5 1 (3.13%) IT Engineer
5 1 (3.13%) Junior Analyst
5 1 (3.13%) Junior Data Analyst
5 1 (3.13%) ServiceNow Developer
5 1 (3.13%) SharePoint Developer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 2 (6.25%) ADO
2 1 (3.13%) CSS
2 1 (3.13%) Web Services
Miscellaneous
1 3 (9.38%) Enterprise Cloud
2 1 (3.13%) CMDB
2 1 (3.13%) Driving Licence
2 1 (3.13%) NHS
2 1 (3.13%) Onboarding
Operating Systems
1 4 (12.50%) Windows
1 4 (12.50%) Windows 10
2 3 (9.38%) Unix
3 2 (6.25%) Mac OS
4 1 (3.13%) Windows Server
Processes & Methodologies
1 10 (31.25%) Agile
2 8 (25.00%) Continuous Improvement
3 6 (18.75%) ITIL
4 5 (15.63%) Change Management
4 5 (15.63%) Customer Service
4 5 (15.63%) Problem-Solving
4 5 (15.63%) Stakeholder Management
5 4 (12.50%) Demand Management
5 4 (12.50%) DevOps
5 4 (12.50%) Mentoring
5 4 (12.50%) Ticket Management
6 3 (9.38%) Data Engineering
6 3 (9.38%) Data Modelling
6 3 (9.38%) ETL
6 3 (9.38%) Incident Management
6 3 (9.38%) ITSM
6 3 (9.38%) Line Management
6 3 (9.38%) Process Improvement
6 3 (9.38%) Service Management
6 3 (9.38%) Test Strategy
Programming Languages
1 5 (15.63%) Python
1 5 (15.63%) SQL
2 3 (9.38%) Shell Script
3 2 (6.25%) Bash
3 2 (6.25%) Java
3 2 (6.25%) PL/SQL
3 2 (6.25%) VB
4 1 (3.13%) JavaScript
4 1 (3.13%) Scala
Qualifications
1 5 (15.63%) Degree
2 3 (9.38%) Microsoft Certification
3 2 (6.25%) BPSS Clearance
3 2 (6.25%) ISTQB
3 2 (6.25%) ISTQB Foundation Certification
3 2 (6.25%) MCSE
3 2 (6.25%) PRINCE2 Practitioner
4 1 (3.13%) ITIL Certification
4 1 (3.13%) Security Cleared
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 4 (12.50%) PMO
2 3 (9.38%) Data Quality
3 1 (3.13%) GRC
3 1 (3.13%) QA
3 1 (3.13%) Sarbanes-Oxley
System Software
1 4 (12.50%) Active Directory
Systems Management
1 2 (6.25%) HP ALM
1 2 (6.25%) HP Quality Center
1 2 (6.25%) SCCM
Vendors
1 7 (21.88%) Oracle
2 6 (18.75%) Microsoft
3 4 (12.50%) Atlassian
3 4 (12.50%) ServiceNow
4 3 (9.38%) Informatica
4 3 (9.38%) SAP
5 2 (6.25%) Apple
5 2 (6.25%) Cisco
5 2 (6.25%) Cloudera
5 2 (6.25%) HP
5 2 (6.25%) Talend
6 1 (3.13%) Adobe
6 1 (3.13%) Ericsson
6 1 (3.13%) Huawei
6 1 (3.13%) Nokia