What you should be paid as a writer
The rules of engagement
We would like to encourage anyone who is working with a writer to abide
by the basic rules of good practice that have been developed by Arts
Council England and other bodies. Below we give some guidance on rates
of pay and good practice in employment and commissioning and suggest
places where you can go for further help and advice. These notes are
mainly written for employers but are equally as useful to you if you
are the writer.
We believe two things: firstly that you get what you pay for and secondly that writers should always be paid for their work.
A note to writers
Don’t be afraid to stand your ground and tell employers that they must
adhere to accepted rates of pay. Refer to this site as a source of
information if you are offered work which you don’t think pays enough.
Rates of pay for writers
Rates of pay vary depending on the job of work and the circumstances in
which it takes place. The following is a rough outline of recognised
rates of pay for different sorts of work. When we mention specific
sums, these are levels of pay that New Writing North itself pays and
which we think others should aspire to (or exceed!).
Working as a writer in schools
Arts Council England recommends that writers working in schools are
paid £250 per day plus travel expenses. NAWE, the National Association
of Writers in Education, recommends £250 per day. New Writing North
pays writers £200 per day for work in schools and amends this in
relation to the length of sessions that we require. Our standard
calculation is that ‘a whole day's work’ consists of up to two two-hour
sessions with groups of children. This can be interpreted differently,
which leads to different suggested figures for this area of work.
Most writers are freelance and look after their own contributions to
the Inland Revenue, so from the daily fee that you pay them they will
have to deduct tax and insurance.
Please remember that even if you only want a writer to come and talk to
your school for one hour, you are in effect using up a whole day of
work for them and you should expect to pay for a whole day's work. It
would usually be better to expand what the writer could do while in the
school rather than attempt to negotiate the fee downwards.
If a writer is working on a long-term project with a school (more than
one week long for example) it is OK to negotiate the fee in recognition
of the workload and hours worked. New Writing North recently produced a
year-long residency programme for a school. The writer involved with
that project worked at the school for three days per week (during term
time) and was paid an annual fee of £18,000.
If you also want to commission the writer to write the school a poem or
devise a play, this should be paid for on top of the payment for
workshop work as it will be written in the writer's own time.
Again, sometimes this can be negotiated.
We recommend with all long-term residencies that writers are also given
paid time to work on their own writing as part of the fee.
Fees for residencies
There are no hard and fast rules about fees for residencies. Costing a
residency will depend on how and when you want the writer to work. As a
general guide, £175-£200 per day is about the right amount to be
paying. Arts Council England’s guidance states that artists should be
paid £175 a day for a single day's work. If you are looking for a
writer to work say 50 days over a year, the residency fee should
reflect the length of engagement with the project as well as the fee
per day. If your residency is a full-time one, you will have to
consider whether to offer it as a freelance contract or on a PAYE
basis. Arts Council England recommends that annual salaries for
residency posts are equivalent to £23,400 per annum. Most working
writers will look after their own tax and insurance contributions (this
is also reflected in their fees).
The odd day's work here and there
As with the residency fees above, somewhere between £175-£250 per day
is about right, depending on what you are expecting from the writer.
See below for more information on other types of work.
Teaching work
Payment for teaching work outside of visits to schools is a movable
feast depending on where you are working. WEA and Lifelong Learning
organisaitons attached to universities have set rates of pay which you
will be offered. Teaching a course that has been set up somewhere
outside of a formal education setting should be paid at between
£100-£150 a session (assuming that you want the writer to plan the
lessons and read some participants' work between classes).
Writers' workshops
To get a writer to come and run a workshop for adult writers or
aspiring writers should cost around £175-£200, depending on the
complexity of what you require and the kind of group that you want them
to work with. Very well known writers charge between £250-£500 for
workshops and if they are travelling to get to the event will also need
to have their travel and accommodation costs covered.
Readings and gigs
Fees for readings vary a great deal depending on where the event is
happening and who the promoter is. New Writing North pays between £200
and £500 to writers for readings and appearances at events. Our
standard rate of pay is £200 and this rises depending on the popularity
of the author and the price set by their agents.
We also offer travel and accommodation payments. Publishers might be
able to fix up readings by writers for free if they are promoting a
book at the time but you will probably have to work hard to convince
them that you will be able to guarentee a fair amount of book sales at
the event for them to do this.
Travel expenses
When contracting a writer for work on one-off visits, workshops and
events you will need to offer travel expenses. The accepted guide for
this is to pay either a second class rail ticket or a pence per mile
mileage payment if the journey is under a certain distance. If a
journey is over 50 miles and the writer is travelling by car it is fair
to offer an equivalent rail fair rather than mileage. If the place that
you want the writer to work in is in a particularly difficult place to
get to you should expect to negotiate on this.
New Writing North pays between 25p-35p per mile for travel expenses in
a car, depending on the length of the journey. We sometimes also pay
‘equivalent train fair’ if a writer prefers to drive to the job but
going by train would be cheaper for the company.
Accommodation
As a general rule, accommodation does not mean being put up in
someone’s house (however nice that house may be). It means a decent
B&B or modest hotel and includes breakfast. The accommodation
should be within easy reach of the event or workshop venue.
Commissions for theatre writers
The Independent Theatre Council is able to
give advice on union agreed rates of pay for the commissioning of
theatre plays for both professional and non- professional groups. The
rates are graded to the length of the play and take into account both
full scale and one act plays. Arts Council England has also just
published a very useful guide
that gives information on how non-professional theatre companies or
non-theatre-based organisations can commission new plays from writers.
Commissions for television
The Writer's Guild of Great Britain negotiates union rates for both theatre and TV, radio and screen
commissions and can offer advice on what you should be paid.
Books
There are no set guidelines for how much someone should pay you to
write a book. If you are at the point of negotiating this with
publishers, we advise that you make contact with an agent and ask them
to negotiate on your behalf as you are likely to be offered a
complicated contract. The best written advice on how to understand
contracts we have found is in a book called From Pitch to Publication
by the agent Carole Blake. This book has detailed chapters on contracts
and rights which are very useful.
|
