Wor Camping Options

[RLM]

There has not been much discussion on the website about work camping so I decided to start the topic. I am sure that there are members of the site who do work camping and some that would like to get into it. I suspect that both categories could improve the learning curve for each other.

Some ideas to respond to:

1- Who works for only a free site and who works for the money? Why do you do either?
2- What's the best way to get started?
3- Because of the lack of work camping experience and competition for jobs, does one have to accept the first offer even if it isn't suited for you?
4- How much effort and time does it take to get the idea work camper job? What is involved?
5- Is work camping in a commercial campground preferable to a public one like a national park or forest service?
6- What is your best and worst experience?
7- For those who have work camped, what is the one (one only) valuable piece of advise you could give someone considering it?
8- For those who are just getting into the work camping thing, what's the most annoying aspect of the process?

[Jerry S.]

RLM,

It has been years since I've had to deal with the contractor vs. employee issue, so things may be different now. In general, some situations were defined by law as to whether or not some one was an employee or a contractor. In situations where the statuatory rules did not apply, a list of factors were used to determine whether a worker was an employee or contractor. Searching way back, I remember some of the factors being things like hours worked, work schedule, who provides the "tools" to perform the job, where the work was performed, does the worker provide these services for other businesses, and so on. A simplistic example would be lawn care/landscaping work. If I work camp for you and do your lawn care when you tell me with your equipment, I am an employee. If I do lawn care for 10 customers in the area with my own equipment, I am an independent constractor. From my limited knowlege of all the types of services (janitorial/maintenance, reception, store clerk, etc.) work campers do, I can see why they would be considered employees under tax laws. Just because some park owners don't do it this way doesn't mean it is legal.

Again, the "rules" may have changed it recent years, but from what Western said, I have a feeling that they have not changed significantly.