Lady jumping Home | News & events | Legal updates | Retailers who use agency workers should note

Retailers who use agency workers should note

26 March 2008

Retailers who use agency workers should note that after a long awaited decision from the Court of Appeal the current law in this area remains unchanged.

Only employees are entitled to certain protections under employment law, such as the right to claim unfair dismissal. Agency workers, whose services are supplied to an “enduser” client by an employment agency, will have some sort of contract with their agency and that agency will have a contract for the provision of services with the end user.

This arrangement has been characterised as a “tri-partite” relationship. Some agency workers have been arguing that they have in fact become the employees of the end-user client - particularly where the same agency worker has been placed with the end-user for a long period - by means of an implied contract and are thus entitled to make employment claims against the end user.

Trade union officials have been lobbying for an extension of employment rights for agency workers and this is likely to be debated again at a European level later this year.

Are any of the issues in this article giving you a headache? If so, we want to know

Name *

Comments*

I agree to Shoosmiths holding information about me in accordance with its privacy policy.*

To subscribe to our news updates click here.

 

Email this page

Get in touch

Eugene Wojciechowski

Partner
T: 08700 86 8998
I: +44 (0)118 965 8998
E: eugene.wojciechowski@shoosmiths.co.uk