STF again denies employment relationship to app delivery person

Justice

The case concerns a delivery person for the Rappi app, who had his employment relationship recognized by the Superior Labor Court

The First Panel of the Federal Supreme Court (STF) once again unanimously overturned the employment relationship of a worker via app, which had been recognized by the Superior Labor Court (TST).

The process is judged in the virtual plenary, in which ministers have a period to vote electronically. The session, in this case, ends at the end of this Tuesday (20), but all members of the First Panel have already voted: Alexandre de Moraes, Cristiano Zanin, Luiz Fux and Cármen Lúcia.

Everyone followed the understanding of Zanin, rapporteur of the complaint on the matter. This type of process results in a non-binding decision, that is, it does not need to be applied automatically by other judicial bodies.

The case concerns a delivery person for the Rappi app, who had his employment relationship recognized by the Sixth Panel of the Superior Labor Court (TST). Zanin had already granted an injunction (provisional decision), requested by the company, to suspend the labor court decision.

The injunction has now been confirmed by the other ministers of the First Panel. They followed Zanin’s understanding, according to which the TST has disrespected previous Supreme Court decisions on alternative forms of employment contracts.

“In the case under analysis, when recognizing the employment relationship, the Labor Court disregarded the legal aspects related to the issue, in particular the precedents of the Federal Supreme Court that enshrine economic freedom, organization of productive activities and admit other forms of hiring of service provision”,

wrote Zanin.

The ministers agreed with the argument of the company Rappi, for whom the Supreme Court has already expressed its opinion on the matter when it allowed the outsourcing of core activities and authorized, in previous actions, alternative forms of contracting, which do not necessarily need to follow the rules of the Consolidation of Labor Laws (CLT).

For the Sixth Panel of the TST, however, the method of contracting between the application and the delivery person is fraudulent, because despite providing an alternative form of employment, in practice the work has the same characteristics and duties as a formal job, with a formal contract. , but without the rights guaranteed by the CLT.

Plenary

Last week, the Supreme Court even scheduled another complaint on the matter to be judged in plenary, by all the ministers that make up the Court, but the case ended up not being judged and there is no new date for analysis.

Last year, the Attorney General’s Office (PGR) defended that the issue be taken to the plenary, as there is a need to balance different constitutional commands, such as the social valorization of work and the guarantee of free economic initiative.

Next Friday (23), the Supreme Court will begin to judge whether to declare the general repercussion of an extraordinary appeal on the topic. This is the first step for the Court to produce a binding thesis, that is, one that must be applied mandatorily by all judges in the country.

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