On 27 January 2026, the Amsterdam Court of Appeal passed a judgment on the legal position of Uber drivers. In the opinion of the Court of Appeal, the six drivers who joined the proceedings on the side of Uber must be designated as self-employed persons rather than employees. The Court of Appeal emphasized that it is not possible to express a general opinion on all Uber drivers, because it is concrete circumstances that are decisive. This judgment confirms that the adjudication of (false) self-employment requires a customized approach, in which the entrepreneurship of a worker may play a significant role.
Interpretation of Supreme Court Deliveroo criteria
In the first instance, trade union FNV claimed that all drivers of Uber should be regarded as employees and be subject to the collective labour agreement for Care Transport and Taxi. In 2021, the Subdistrict Court endorsed this position, but the Court of Appeal has now arrived at a different outcome.
Prior to its decision, the Court of Appeal asked the Supreme Court how the concept of entrepreneurship should be weighted within the Deliveroo review framework, and to what extent a court can assess the employment relationship of entire group of workers in one single legal action.
The Supreme Court clarified that:
• the Deliveroo framework offers no fixed ranking order between the points of view for the qualification of the employment relationship;
• workers who do the same work for the same client can nevertheless be qualified differently, depending on the extent to which they in fact behave as entrepreneurs;
• a court can pronounce a general opinion on employment, but only if the relevant circumstances within the group are sufficiently similar to justify such an adjudication.
Application to the six drivers
The Court of Appeal applied the above principles to the six drivers who had joined the appeal proceedings. It found that the actual circumstances of Uber drivers differ strongly as to investments, costs, dependence on the organisation, and risks borne. This makes it impossible to express a collective opinion about them.
On the basis of the statements and documents submitted by the six drivers, the Court of Appeal concluded that they operate predominantly as entrepreneurs. The decisive circumstances are that they:
• make substantial investments in their cars and the exploitation;
• can freely determine their own working hours and are free to accept or refuse rides;
• make their own choices as to working method, strategy, and earning model;
• fully bear their own entrepreneurial risk, including liability and the absence of continued payment of wages during illness.
In the opinion of the Court of Appeal, these factors do in the end outweigh elements that would indicate an employment agreement. A previous interlocutory judgment still seemed to tip the balance the other way, but after the Supreme Court’s reply to the preliminary questions and the substantiated defence of the drivers on their entrepreneurship, the Court of Appeal arrived at this consideration, in which it focused on the entrepreneurship of the drivers concerned.
No general opinion about all Uber drivers
The Court of Appeal emphasized that it cannot be stated in general that all Uber drivers are employees, because the qualification will always depend on the concrete facts and circumstances of an individual worker.
Besides, the Court of Appeal held that the trade union FNV had not submitted sufficiently concrete and current information to distinguish clearly marked subgroups that could be adjudicated collectively. In the absence of this substantiation, the Court of Appeal could not give a broader opinion.
This ruling is another case in point why the qualification of self-employed persons requires a customized approach. Organisations working with self-employed persons would do well to assess for each individual worker whether they must be designated as a self-employed person or a false self-employed person. The worker’s entrepreneurship is an important aspect in this assessment. One example of checking this is to use the Declaration on income of self-employed person (Verklaring inkomen zelfstandig ondernemer).
Do you have questions about this judgment or its consequences? Please feel free to contact Eylard van Fenema or Ruud Schepers.