Employment Status

Autoclenz Ltd v Belcher & ors

The Supreme Court considers whether express contractual provisions in a consultancy agreement reflected genuine self-employment, and concludes that they did not.

Employees come with two expensive price tags. The first is a raft of statutory rights, such as the right not to be unfairly dismissed. The second is employer's National Insurance Contributions, currently charged at 13.8% of earnings and paid by the employer. Businesses are well aware of this and their professional advisers will be all too familiar with the refrain "let's make him a consultant then".

Many businesses will know that such a 'transformation' is not easy to achieve and that the manner in which the parties describe themselves (and their intentions) will not be decisive if...