The events industry runs on freelancers. From riggers and sound engineers to lighting designers and stage managers, the flexible workforce is what allows event production companies to scale up for large projects and scale down between them. But managing a freelance workforce brings a unique set of challenges — scheduling, compliance, payment processing, and the ever-present question of IR35.
This guide covers the practical realities of freelancer management in events, including the IR35 rules that every UK event company needs to understand.
Why events rely on freelancers
The events industry has a fundamental characteristic that makes freelancers essential: demand is variable. A production company might need 50 crew for a festival in July and 5 for a corporate event in November. Maintaining a permanent workforce large enough for peak demand would be financially unsustainable during quiet periods.
Freelancers provide the flexibility to match workforce size to workload. They bring specialist skills that may only be needed occasionally — a pyrotechnics operator, a specific console programmer, a structural engineer for complex builds. And they bring their own networks, often recommending other freelancers when they are unavailable.
This model works well operationally, but it creates significant management overhead. Every freelancer engagement involves availability checking, booking confirmation, skills verification, compliance documentation, and payment processing. Multiply that by dozens or hundreds of freelancers across multiple events, and the administrative burden is substantial.
Understanding IR35
IR35 is the common name for the off-payroll working rules — UK tax legislation that determines whether a freelancer is genuinely self-employed or is, in reality, a "disguised employee" who should be taxed as an employee.
The original IR35 legislation was introduced in April 2000. Its purpose was to address situations where individuals were providing their services through an intermediary (typically their own limited company) but would be considered employees if they were engaged directly. The legislation ensures that these individuals pay broadly the same tax and National Insurance as employees.
For medium and large businesses in the private sector (and all public sector organisations), the responsibility for determining IR35 status shifted from the freelancer to the engaging company in April 2021. This means that if you hire freelancers through their limited companies, your company is responsible for assessing whether each engagement falls inside or outside IR35.
The three key IR35 tests
IR35 status is not determined by a single factor but by the overall picture of the working relationship. However, three tests carry the most weight in HMRC assessments and tribunal decisions:
1. Control
Does the company control how, when, and where the work is done? If a freelancer is told exactly how to perform their tasks, must work set hours, and must work at a specific location, this points towards employment. If the freelancer has autonomy over how they deliver the result, this points towards self-employment.
In events, this test is nuanced. A freelancer must obviously be on site at the venue during the event. But the question is whether they have control over how they do their work — a skilled sound engineer who decides how to mix the show is in a different position from a general labourer who is directed step by step.
2. Mutuality of obligation
Is the company obliged to offer work, and is the freelancer obliged to accept it? In an employment relationship, the employer provides work and the employee is expected to do it. In a genuine freelance relationship, neither party is obliged — the company offers work on a per-engagement basis, and the freelancer is free to accept or decline.
For event companies, this test is often met by the nature of the engagement: freelancers are booked per event, and there is no expectation of ongoing work between events.
3. Right of substitution
Can the freelancer send someone else in their place? If a freelancer has a genuine right to send a substitute — and the company cannot refuse unreasonably — this is a strong indicator of self-employment. If the company insists that a specific individual must do the work, this looks more like employment.
In practice, substitution in events is complex. A client may have specifically requested a particular lighting designer, making substitution impractical even if the contractual right exists.
Inside vs outside IR35
The consequences of IR35 status are straightforward:
- Outside IR35: The freelancer is genuinely self-employed. You pay their limited company the agreed gross fee. The freelancer is responsible for their own tax and National Insurance.
- Inside IR35: The engagement is deemed employment for tax purposes. The company engaging the freelancer must deduct PAYE income tax, employee National Insurance contributions, and pay employer National Insurance before making the payment. This significantly increases the cost to the company or reduces the freelancer's take-home pay.
Getting the determination wrong in either direction carries risks. Wrongly classifying someone as outside IR35 when they should be inside exposes your company to back-taxes, penalties, and interest from HMRC. Wrongly classifying someone as inside IR35 when they are genuinely outside can lead to disputes with freelancers and may make it harder to attract talent.
Practical freelancer management challenges
Beyond IR35, event companies face several practical challenges in managing their freelance workforce:
- Tracking availability: Freelancers work for multiple companies. Knowing who is available for a specific date range requires either individual communication (time-consuming) or a shared availability system.
- Skills matching: Matching the right freelancer to the right job requires knowing their skills, certifications, experience, and equipment familiarity. This information needs to be stored, maintained, and searchable.
- Scheduling across multiple events: When you have several events running simultaneously, scheduling crew without conflicts requires a centralised view of all bookings and assignments.
- Payment processing: Freelancers may have different rates for different roles, day rates vs half-day rates, overtime arrangements, and travel allowances. Processing payments accurately and on time is essential for maintaining good relationships.
- Compliance documentation: Ensuring every freelancer has current certifications (IPAF, PASMA, first aid, etc.), valid insurance, and the correct right-to-work documentation. Expired certifications create liability risks.
What freelancer management software should offer
If you are evaluating software to help manage your freelance workforce, these are the capabilities that matter for event companies:
- Skills and certification database: A searchable database of all your freelancers with their skills, qualifications, certification expiry dates, and equipment experience. The system should alert you when certifications are due to expire.
- Availability calendar: Freelancers can set their own availability, and your booking team can see at a glance who is free for a given date range and skillset.
- Automated booking requests: Send availability requests to a filtered group of freelancers and track responses centrally, rather than sending individual messages.
- Day rate tracking: Store role-specific and freelancer-specific rates, calculate costs per event, and track actual hours against budgeted hours.
- Compliance documentation: Store and track IR35 status determinations, insurance certificates, right-to-work documents, and certification records. Flag any gaps before a freelancer is assigned to a job.
- Integration with payroll: Approved hours and rates feed into payment processing, with correct treatment for inside vs outside IR35 engagements.
NexusRMS includes freelancer management as part of its platform, with skills databases, availability management, booking workflows, day rate tracking, and compliance documentation. This sits alongside equipment booking and project management, giving event production companies a single system for both their equipment and their people.
Building a reliable freelancer network
The event companies that consistently deliver excellent work are the ones with deep, well-managed freelancer networks. They know who their best people are, they keep them busy, they pay them on time, and they handle compliance properly. Building and maintaining that network is not a side task — it is a core business function that deserves the right tools and processes.
Whether you manage 10 freelancers or 500, the fundamentals are the same: know their skills, track their availability, book them efficiently, pay them accurately, and keep your compliance documentation in order. The companies that get this right have a genuine competitive advantage in an industry where talent is everything.