In person For the v Mr A Famitumi, Peninsula — 2019

This was a preliminary hearing on employment status in the claim of Mr Cristian Dumitrescu against Apple Central Taxis Ltd. The claimant brought a race discrimination claim and a claim for accrued but unpaid holiday pay. The tribunal’s judgment was that the claims were dismissed.

The tribunal found that the respondent operated a taxi business in which drivers paid a weekly circuit fee of £140 to access the booking system, retained cash fares themselves, and were responsible for their own vehicles, insurance, fuel, tax, MOTs, and private hire licensing. The claimant joined in 2017, accepted self-employed status, paid his own tax and National Insurance, and used his own cars, including a BMW 5 series and later a Maserati. He was given the usual induction and the Drivers’ Handbook, but the tribunal accepted the respondent’s evidence that drivers could also work for other companies.

A central issue was substitution. The tribunal accepted that the claimant had a right to delegate driving duties and appoint a substitute driver, subject only to regulatory checks and the substitute having access to the respondent’s system through a separate smartphone PDA. The judge found that this right was not dependent on the substitute already being bound by the same obligations as the claimant, and distinguished the authorities relied on by the claimant, including Pimlico Plumbers, Addison Lee, and Uber.

Applying the contractual status tests, the tribunal found there was no obligation of personal service and therefore no contract personally to do work for the purposes of section 83 EqA 2010 or regulation 2 WTR 1998. It further held that the claimant was not a limb (b) worker under section 230(3)(b) ERA 1996. On that basis, the race discrimination claim failed because the claimant was not 'in employment' under the Equality Act, and the holiday pay claim failed because he was not a worker for Working Time Regulations purposes.