Employment status law – Part-time football referees’ contracts can constitute contracts of employment – Commissioners for HMRC v Professional Game Match Officials Ltd [2024] UKSC 29
In this case the Supreme Court found that part-time football referees could as a matter of law and for tax purposes be employees of Professional Game Match Officials Ltd, the administrative body which engages with and organises them. The engagement operates in such a way that PGMOL extends an offer to the referee to ref a particular game on the Saturday which the referee can accept. From the moment of acceptance of the offer to completion of the match report after the game there is the essential ‘mutuality of obligation’ that is essential for a contract of employment, even though the arties were free to cancel before the referee arrived at the ground. Furthermore PGMOL controlled the referees conduct through the terms of the contract. But the third factor that is essential for the employment contract to be established in each case was for all of the surrounding circumstances known to each party on a case by case basis to be consistent with employment. Only a fact finding tribunal – in this instance the First Tier Tax Tribunal – could decide whether in the light of all the relevant circumstances individual referee’s contracts were contracts of employment for income tax and NI purposes.
Judgment details – Commissioners for HMRC v Professional Game Match Officials Ltd [2024] UKSC 29
Practical tip
What is interesting about this case is that it confirms the approach the Courts have taken in determining whether individual personal service company contractors are caught by the Off Payroll Workers rules for the purposes of IR35. Freelancers who operate or wish to consider operating through personal service companies and indeed hirers or ‘clients’ who wish to engage with such contractors should take advice from their employment lawyers on a case by case basis to give all parties of achieving the desired outcome in terms of correct employment status.
