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Freelancers Union — Why I’m Already in Love And Why You Should Be Too

June 7th, 2008 at 9:31 pm

Source:CenterNetworks

Freelancers UnionIf you live in NYC and ride the subway, you’ve seen the advertisements for the Freelancers Union. Their tagline is, "A federation of the unaffiliated." and they define the service as, "a nonprofit organization that represents the needs of America’s independent workforce though advocacy, information, and service." The Freelancers Union claims that over 30% of the entire U.S. workforce are indie workers. Most of the services the Freelancers Union provides are available nationwide.

There are no fees to be a Freelancers Union member and frankly anyone who works for themselves (blogger, web developer, designer, writer, etc.) should be a member. The benefits the group offers are just awesome. Health insurance is the number one benefit in my opinion.

When I lived in Atlanta my health insurance for a good plan ran about $140/month. The same plan in NYC was 10x more or $1,400/month (no I am not kidding). An even better plan (also with Blue Cross) with the Freelancers Union runs around $210/month. Please note that these are single rates. There’s also a dental savings plan that normally is $7.50/month but with FU it’s $3/month.

Another awesome benefit is for Zipcar rentals. In NYC the normal Zipcar rates for an average car are $10.50-12.50/hour Mon-Thurs and $12.50-$14.50 Friday. When you join the Freelancers Union, that rate drops to $8.00 on all weekdays. This has already saved me a good bit of money and you get a wider selection of cars. From my testing this morning, discounts in other cities that Zipcar serves are similar.

There are a ton of other discounts including Web services Harvest (our coverage) and FreshBooks (our coverage). The Staples corporate pricing is pretty sweet.

There are also a variety of networking events/meetups, educational courses and a job/gig board.

To become a member you need to demonstrate income over $10,000 within the past six months. Seriously, even if you just use it for the Zipcar discounts, the Freelancers Union membership is very much worth the cost (which is free).

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