Patrícia Perestrelo and Rosário Mexia Alves comment on changes to labour law in contracts between couriers and intermediaries
The Government aims to streamline the process of recognising employment contracts in the digital platform sector, particularly in the case of couriers. The proposal forms part of the labour law reform and seeks to clarify the relationship between workers, intermediaries and platforms.
Since May 2023, the Labour Code has established a presumption of employment which has, by default, been automatically applied to digital platforms. In other words, these platforms have been considered potential employers, with courts first assessing their relationship with the couriers.
According to Patrícia Perestrelo and Rosário Mexia Alves, “the indicators of employment applicable to platform workers will become the general ones, with the addition of the indicator relating to the existence, or not, of autonomy in the provision of services, assessed in light of factors specific to the digital context.”
The Government also introduces an economic dependency criterion: these indicators will only apply when the courier works for the platform on a regular basis and when at least 80% of their activity is carried out for that beneficiary.
Even so, as the Abreu Advogados lawyers emphasise, the presumption is not absolute and may be rebutted, which confirms that the legislator does not intend to eliminate the possibility of evidence to the contrary.
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