kljpj

Hi peeps,

My first post so, hello all out there! Even though I'm not British I've been living in London for the past 5 years so lets say I'm 1/6 or so . I'll try to be brief and clear on my question(s).

I currently work as a software developer in the visual effects industry in London and recently found that a known US company has a branch in KL. Having been to KL (and some other places in Malaysia) twice (as a tourist only) and having enjoyed it so much I thought I could give it a go and contact them. Cutting it short, after a few calls and emails, there seems to be some interest on their side to hire me. I've recently had a quick chat with one of their recruiters and he asked me if I was aware of the differences between UK/Malaysian salaries (which sounds to me that they're not willing to pay much if this goes forward).
I've been reading your forums for a couple of weeks now but I feel that I need some more info/feedback.

My gross salary in here is around GPB 50K and I manage to save an average of £600 per month. Also £150 of my gross salary goes to a pension scheme and my company puts £150 on top of that (as a benefit). This totals £900 of what I consider "unflexible" money, i.e., I won't accept less than this fixed sum whererever I move to (I'd be "losing" money if I was saving less).
Subtracting my bills (food, rent, transportation, utilies) I'm probably left with around £700 or so. It's hard to specify where I spend this. However, I know I "manage" on average to spend a fairly big part of this (clothes, pub/entertainment, wife, flights) - it's that kind of money that goes out of one's account and "you can't explain" how

After reading quite a few post I was left confused with what would be a good salary, so I'd try to put the question in different terms: what would be the minimum "equivalent" salary I could consider if moving to KL. My wife would be moving with me and could eventually get a job in the same company but I'm not counting with that so my salary would cover both of us.
My largest expenses are holidays (when I can), 1/2 visits to the pub p/week (less than £60 a month?) and eating out.

Another (very) important issue for me is the transportation. The company is located in Cyberjaya. Ideally they would give me a car (don't think so though).
It seems that the LRT connects KL and a few suburbs to that area and it would be fairly easy to commute (?). I wouldn't like to spend more than 30/40 mins commuting though. Futhermore, is living close to that area (so I could walk/cycle) an option? As far as I understood there's not much going on in those areas and I don't want to be competely isolated from the world .

I'll stop writing now and wait for some feedback from you.

Cheers!

P.S. - I might do a random survey of my bank statements to have a better clue of where my money is spent on...

ajw

Hi There

Welcome to the forums. As you're probably aware, there is a very large disparity in wages between the UK and Malaysia. What level would you be hired at? Most firms would only be prepared to pay expat rates to very senior hires. My husband works in IT here are hires for IT roles across the board. On average a developer gets around 5000rm a month, someone more senior might get up to 8000rm a month. These are the going rates for local software developers. I've not heard of a developer being provided a company car. If the company thinks you have a lot more to offer then its all up for negotiation!

Good Luck!

Ajw

kljpj

Thanks for your reply . We haven't discussed about the position level yet, but it would be a mid/senior level position. The values you mention are very low indeed. In any case, I don't think anything under 8K seems equivalent in Malaysia to mine in the UK: even though the salaries are not insanely high in vfx they do tend to be better paid than general IT roles (not as good as finance IT ones of course ) as it's a bit of a niche industry.
Still, what I'm having troubles figuring out is what I could consider a roughly equivalent salary over there. Since rent seems to be what gets the largest chunk of the salary I'm also trying to figure out would be my commute options. Thanks once more. Some more feedback would be very helpful.

Dd33

check out iproperty.com.my for rental options. On top of whatever salary they offer you, they will more than likely offer you a housing allowance, travel allowance, food allowance and scarcity allowance if you do something that they can't hire a local to do. I would expect no leass than 12k MYR because you will be hit with 26-28% tax for the first six months which brings you down to 9k subtract at least 2k MYR for rent and then the same for food and entertainment which will leave you with 5k MYR roughly 1k pounds sterling to save or travel with. Obviously you can find cheaper accomodation and cheaper food and entertainment but if you want to have enough to 'play' I'd say you wouldn't be able to with less than 2k MYR per month. I think Cyberjaya isn't too bad, probably not very many expats but there will be some and rent will be cheap. The LRT is very good so if you lived out there you could always take the train into the city when you feel like it. Other option is living near the serdang station as there are lots of australian expats near there because of the school. hope that helps

kljpj

Hi Dd33,

Cheers for your complete reply - it does help a lot. I've considered the LRT option, but it seems that adding the average waiting times for a bus on top of that could easily amount to 1h (even more than in London ). It seems in Malaysia frequency means every 20/30 mins (we're a bit spoiled in London I guess).

Dd33

The Lrt is much more frequent than 20-30 mins, the most I have ever waited for the lrt is 7 mins.. You may be confusing it with the commuter trains which run on the kind of schedule you mention. I wouldn't bother with a bus taxis are very cheap here.

kljpj

Oopps, you're right they're different trains .
However, the LRT doesn't seem to stop at Cyberjaya. Perhaps, like you say, the combination of that with a taxi could be an option. I'll do some more research. Cheers!