What's my hourly rate?

[ciphergoth]

Just got an email. "I'm after a Perl programmer - what's your hourly rate?"

I haven't the faintest idea.

If you work it out from my gross salary, you get £18.82, but is that the right amount to charge? I have never charged an hourly rate before, but I would like to quote something reasonably plausible. Eek, that's like 31p a minute - I go to spend a penny, and get paid about 62p for it. That sounds OK. But I'd like to hear that confirmed from someone who's done contract work before.

I'd be grateful to hear from anyone who knows...

Update: many thanks for the many helpful answers!

Comments

[akicif.livejournal.com]

The people I've seen who I can most directly compare to your sort of stuff[1] - java hackers and clever database types, tend to be on 80-100 an hour, and this is by no means the top end -- remember, ALL your expenses (tax, BOTH lots of NI, any health and pension stuff) come out of that...

[1] That's clever perl stuff, not run of the mill stuff, yes?