HN user
Well, it seems thinking behind salaries at startups in London is simple - get a cheap workforce (ideally fresh uni graduates) and let them falsely believe that they can get rich by giving them a tiny slice of stock options. Ironically the people who are hiring them would very often badly struggle passing tech interview at another company - especially when sometimes you're interviewed by people who have no background in CS.
we have had rather similar experience with RS support. Essentially when you call in what's happening is you get to talk to some people who literally have no clue and are just "call" masters...they HOPEFULLY after some time pass you on to L1 technicians who have A clue...and it goes on and on and on like this until someone more senior takes over and resolves the issue. Worth the extra money ? Nah. The only advantage I'm seeing is non-ephemeral instances, though you should be prepared for failure in Cloud and don't expect miracles.