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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Andy D." data-source="post: 41930" data-attributes="member: 5620">Since I'm the OP I am more then happy to answer some further questions on the above (obviously within reason). Daniel you're right, it does sound mostly like catching trains and to be honest that is how it felt for the 7 months of the contract <img src="data:image/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAIAAAAAAAP///yH5BAEAAAAALAAAAAABAAEAAAIBRAA7" class="smilie smilie--sprite smilie--sprite2" alt=";)" title="Wink    ;)" loading="lazy" data-shortname=";)" /> however I will endeavor to expand on my role below.So distance commuted:bigbadwolf - Yes you're right, it was about 60 odd miles. I was commuting in from Sussex each morning to give you an idea. I had to get to the bus stop, then to the local train station, then obviously into London. If you missed a bus then well.. ughs. Especially if it was raining.To add to that, there were folks coming in from Staffordshire each day as well which was a haul.Thinkdifferent - Yeah eating at your desk isn't much fun. However when you are sitting in an office with a lot of full time folks who know the contractors are on a lot more than them, you tend to feel like you are "taking the pi$$" of you stroll off for a long lunch - especially when they are bitching about other full-time team members who aren't pulling their weightOne thing I did notice was that, with there being a number of consultants and contractors in our area, some of them get a frosty reception when they rocked the boat somewhat. Also to add to that, we billed for every hour we worked, so over-time and short lunches made sense, especially if you wanted to head off early on a Friday.As for the actual content of the work.I was developing software that was going to be rolled out to the various teams in all the countries the banks had offices in. This meant TC's with folks in Hong Kong and Mexico for example.As a by-product of that, it wasn't unusual to stay late to catch a call with folks in NY for example.Our work days were pretty intense in that we had a lot of coding to do and testing. Thank god for my ipod, which thankfully we were permitted to use.My specific role was integrating the new software into an existing delivery system.  This in itself was fairly interesting although you soon come into contact with bank I.T bureaucracy which has a habit of slowing the job down somewhat.  As for compensation (since it was brought up) the money was very very good and made the contract well worth it. I'd happily do seven months a year and take the other five off if it was guaranteed <img src="data:image/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAIAAAAAAAP///yH5BAEAAAAALAAAAAABAAEAAAIBRAA7" class="smilie smilie--sprite smilie--sprite2" alt=";)" title="Wink    ;)" loading="lazy" data-shortname=";)" />, but the bank certainly got its money worth.As a side note, working on a Saturday afforded me an excellent view of the Red Bull stunt plane event over the Thames one Saturday which was pretty good fun.Also I have to say, I was lucky in that, the project involved two phases. Around halfway through the project we had a break of about a month, whilst the SME's produced documentation for the next phase of the project. I took advantage of that month and spent it in France which was great.The second half of the project though was pretty intense with a tight time-line and huge amount of work, but the month in France helped! I can see how people get burnt out. All in all I was with the bank for eight months, a month of which was off, the other seven working.Hope that sheds some more light on the role.</blockquote>

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