EU Platform Work Directive: The Irish Position on Classification

We recently contributed to an article tracking the progress and setting out the essentials in relation to the Platform Work Directive (the ‘Directive‘).

As noted by our colleagues, the Directive will provide additional rights and protections for some categories of workers in the gig economy throughout the EU, including in classification cases and in relation to automated monitoring and decision-making. Its level of impact and the challenges arising will vary by jurisdiction.

What to Expect with Transposition in Ireland

The deadline for transposition is 2 December 2026. We do not have draft legislation in Ireland, notwithstanding that some of the key anticipated changes will be significant. Here is a recap of where things stand on worker classification, this summary is confined to those elements of the Directive.

The drafting of implementing legislation in Ireland should progress shortly. The Government has stated that it is on track to complete the transposition by the December deadline. Legislation will be passed and several competent authorities will then likely update relevant ‘Codes of Practice’, which are guidelines influencing the determination of employment status for both employment rights and tax/deductions purposes.

How Impactful Will the Changes Be?

This is difficult to predict in the absence of draft legislation but a public consultation has been conducted and stakeholders surveyed as far back as October 2025. The submissions have not yet been made publicly available, nor has the anticipated expert report.

However, there has been much focus in recent years on the classification of workers. An examination of the nature of the relationship often arises in Workplace Relations Commission (‘WRC‘) cases where workers seek the protections of employment legislation. In these cases, the WRC often applied existing codes of practice and not forgetting the Karshan¹ case, a landmark decision of the Irish Courts arising from a dispute concerning social security. This involves a five-step assessment which includes a focus, among other things, on whether or not the individual is providing services personally and the degree of control over the individual. These are threshold questions and will remain the position.

Control

Where there are facts indicating that a digital labour platform directs and controls the person performing platform work, there will be a rebuttable presumption of ’employment’. There is currently no such legal presumption in Irish law. In employment rights cases, it falls to the individual worker to seek to establish that the relationship is one of ’employment’.

In preparation for the Directive, input has been sought from stakeholders in Ireland regarding how digital labour platforms manage workers, including questions with a view to analysing prevalent ‘indicators of control’. It remains unclear whether legislation will define specific ‘indicators of control’, or whether the legislature will instead leave it to be determined on a case-by-case basis what types of evidence are sufficient to trigger a presumption of employment.

Personal Service

As set out in our recent article, we expect that an examination of whether or not the worker is providing their own services personally will remain one of the key factors in such disputes and in particular in the context of seeking to rebut the presumption of ’employment’. If they are providing services personally, they will not be employees. We envisage that there will be scope to argue for rebuttal in many cases. Many workers who are treated as independent contractors are genuinely self employed.

Will the Directive Add Clarity?

We consider that there may be a filtering system following transposition. Individuals claiming against a digital labour platform will have a presumption in their favour at the outset of a case, but that can, and often will be, rebutted. Other businesses will not have such a presumption in their favour when seeking to contend that individuals are employees. 

The imminent changes may require a series of preliminary enquiries in relevant tribunal cases e.g. firstly, is the putative employer a relevant digital labour platform?

It is possible that the limited operation of a rebuttable presumption in favour of ’employment’ will apply in some cases and not in others e.g. not cases concerning tax or social security.

The new rules will also have to take account of the existing law; it is hoped that the legislation will be tailored to take account of Karshan. The addition of new approaches regarding relevant platforms may add to the complexity of an already complicated area by producing inconsistent outcomes depending on the context of the case at hand.