Deliveroo brings more than you think 📦

Last year, we wrote about the landmark Deliveroo judgment and the consequences the ruling has for self-employed and other workers. That the ruling has truly far-reaching consequences is shown by the following case.

Recently, the court had to answer the question whether depot owners of DPG Media (NRC and Het Parool) have a contract of assignment or an employment contract. DPG Media uses depot holders to distribute newspapers. In 2020, DPG Media transferred the distribution of its newspapers to Mediahuis. Mediahuis, in turn, entered into agreements with all the depot holders, so the depot holders were effectively in charge of distributing the newspaper.

A year later, as Mediahuis had terminated a depot holder’s agreement, this man went to the subdistrict court asking whether he now had a contract of assignment or an employment contract. The subdistrict court applied the Deliveroo judgment and indeed came to a contract of employment. Both parties appealed from this ruling. ⚖

The Court of Appeal also qualified the agreement as an employment contract and came to that conclusion based on the Deliveroo judgment. According to the Court, there is pay, labour and a relationship of authority between the parties. Mediahuis had direct influence over the depot holder by arranging administrative matters for him and Mediahuis also instructed the depot holder on several points that the depot holder had to follow. Also, the depot holder could not in fact be replaced, he also had no clients other than Mediahuis and was not at financial risk. In fact, the custodian was not an entrepreneur, but fully embedded in the organisation of Mediahuis.

What is interesting is that the tax authorities and the UWV saw the construction as merely “fictitious employment” and not an employment contract. Nevertheless, the court ruled that under civil law, there was still an employment contract. Therefore, if you as a client enter into an agreement with a contractor, you should really check whether it is not secretly an employment contract after all, regardless of what the tax authorities or the UWV think. If you are in doubt contact us.

Read the ruling here!