As a contractor, how do I ask my employer for a new laptop?

Question

Some backstory:

December 2019 I started as a full-time employee at a software development company. They outsourced me for a German project.

There were many red flags and I had to leave.

I continued working as a contractor for the German client. This was kind of complicated to pull off since there were legal issues and whatnot, but eventually it worked. The problem was that there was quite a bit of drama which "exhausted" both me and the client.

Recently, I had some ideas for the project we're working on and I went to the office to try them out, sadly, I found out that my laptop went bust.

I found a replacement, but it's really bad. I obviously need a new one to continue working efficiently. We're using a very heavy to compile language and you need an above average machine to be efficient.

Thing is, I'm not earning too much and I'm paying rent for my office out of my own pocket. I really like the project and especially the client, but conditions-wise, this isn't really the best workplace setup.

Now I would like to ask for a budget for a new laptop, but I don't know how. Given that we were in a very tense situation until very recently, it's kind of hard to ask for money.

How do I ask for a budget without appearing greedy? I'm also concerned that this "my laptop went bust" thing may seem staged.

Update: Thank you all for your answers! As much as I don't want to, I'll pay from my own pocket and not raise this issue with the client. It's entirely my fault that I've gotten into the position I'm now, where I have all the downsides of full-time employment and zero upsides. I'll try and learn from my mistake.

Answer 1

@Tymoteusz Paul's answer is good and I agree with him. I'll try to offer a different perspective, though.

As a general rule of thumb, if you're a contractor, you need to supply your own tools (i.e. both hardware and software) to work. You're not your client's employee. You're providing them with a service for an agreed amount of money. If you hire someone to fix your plumbing at home, they need to bring their own tools.

There are companies that will provide equipment to contractors. Mainly for simplicity and security reasons. This is not always the case, though.

Contracting is a different mindset and it has pros and cons, of course. One of the benefits is that you can choose your rate (needless to say, your client may refuse to pay what you ask for and find someone else) and who you want to work with. Rates for contractors are normally significantly higher than for full-time employees, to compensate for situations like this. Similarly, you can have multiple clients. Maybe you can get another client to make some more money? Maybe you can get a better client instead of the current one? These are questions only you can answer.

As a contractor, how do I ask my employer for a new laptop?

It definitely depends on legislations and the agreement you have with your client, but if this hasn't been discussed, you can ask if they're willing to provide you with a working laptop to do the work for their company. You'll need to explain why that would be beneficial for both your client and you. In my humble opinion, saying "because mine went bust" is unprofessional and won't be taken positively, especially since you mentioned the relationship is tense at the moment. Hence, I don't recommend raising this with your client at this stage.

Your best bet is probably to try to get a second-hand laptop that can do the job. Keep in mind that as a contractor, and again, depending on your location and its legislations, your laptop could be tax-deductible.

Answer 2

How do I ask for a budget without appearing greedy?

Be honest and explain your current situation. While you are a contractor, which means that you generally are responsible for your own tools, they are getting you on the cheap (from what your post says) and clearly like you, there may be some things to do. They could lend you one of their laptops, or extend you a loan against your pay to get one, or maybe decide to do you a solid and buy you a laptop. If you won't ask, you won't know.

I wouldn't worry much about looking greedy from it, especially if you will explain that you are looking for a work laptop, not a handout. This frames the discussion around solving that problem, not about money directly, and as long as you stay reasonable and open to compromise (which includes handling the No/Not now well) it should be fine. Definitely not the most unreasonable request in the world, especially given the history and that they know your cash-strapped situation due to no-pay from old job.

Answer 3

If you genuinely are a contractor, then you have to buy your own equipment. In the USA at least, if they provide equipment for you, you might be seen as a "statutory employee" which can get both you and them in a lot of trouble, with deliberately-punitive tax penalties.

In the USA, however, that computer can be "fully depreciated in one year" under Section 179, which can significantly reduce your tax bill.

Have you considered inviting the Swedish company to hire you? As for me, I don't work as a contractor anymore: you have to hire me, even just for the duration, which means that my situation is no longer nearly so interesting to the tax-man, and you have to take care of the paperwork. I don't have to monkey around with self-employment taxes or with trying to persuade the tax-man that I'm following the rules. The rules have become so arduous that they're not worth having to deal with anymore: that's why companies have accountants and human-resource staff. "Better them than me."

Answer 4

If you're writing Haskell and you're not making enough to cover living expenses and a new laptop, you are being severely ripped off. I would approach whoever is paying you and explain that your laptop broke, that you are not being paid well enough to replace it on your own, and that it will affect your deliverables. They should happily supply you with a new laptop. If they do not, then you have a hard decision to make: keep getting screwed over financially (albeit with other positives that outweigh the lack of pay, right?), or find another job. Good luck to you. It's hard to know your market value, but I guarantee you are not receiving it.

Answer 5

I would like to challenge a bit the question and propose an alternative solution:

You can rent a cloud hosted environment that fits your needs.

Depending on your needs it costs a few cents/euros an hour. You can shut it down everytime you're not using it and thus you only pay for the storage when the environment is shut down (which is ridiculously low).

On the long run it will cost more than a new laptop but in the mean time it's easier to tell your customer you need 100€/month to pay your cloud hosted environment rather than asking upfront for 2000€.

You can also ask your customer if he wants to put this environment on his own paid subscription so he owns your development environment and he'll be able to reuse it if you happen to leave or be in vacation etc.

Also another interesting feature of the cloud hosted environments is the backups are really easy to setup (at the cost of a few euros a month) so you do not run into your current situation again.

Edit:

I see in the comments some people saying he still needs a laptop to use the cloud hosted environment. I want to remind you that in the question it is said that :

I found a replacement, but it's really bad. I obviously need a new one to continue working efficiently. We're using Haskell, which is very heavy to compile and you need an above average machine to be efficient.

So there is a laptop available, it is just not good enough to develop.