Labour and Social Security Inspectorate (ITSS) fines Glovo €57 million for false categorisation of self-employed and engaging workers without work permits

Platform economy database

Database of initiatives and court cases in the EU

Eurofound’s platform economy database provides information on 403 initiatives and court cases that exist or have been implemented in relation to activities in the platform economy. The database was last updated in December 2024 and provides metadata for each entry, such as geographical scope, year, type of initiative, actors involved, sector and companies concerned. Initiatives include legal instruments such as legislative changes or court decisions, as well as voluntary interventions undertaken by different stakeholders to address issues around platform work.

Topic: Platform work Platform economy repository

The database currently contains 403 entries and was last updated in December 2024.

Country

Typology

Sector

Platform

Keyword

Type

Date

24 January 2023

Active

Country

Spain

Geographical scope

National

Type

Type

Provision of insurance and social protection
Legal
Type

Employment contract
Legal

Description

The Labour and Social Security Inspectorate in Madrid has proposed a penalty of €57 million on delivery company Glovo for false classification of self-employed workers and illegal employment of migrant workers.

According to the Inspectorate, 7,022 workers have been wrongly classified and as such are under reported for social security registration, amounting to a total of €32.9 million missing in outstanding co-payments from the employer. This amount has been calculated into the penalty by the Inspectorate along with the €19 million missing from the workers contribution. In addition, Glovo has been fined €5.2 million for engaging 813 workers who were employed without the required work permits.

Following the proposal of penalties on Glovo, the company has announced a restructuring plan which will include the dismissal of 250 employees at its head office in Barcelona, Spain.

Updates (2)

The following recent changes to this court ruling have been recorded.

1 February 2024

A Chamber of the National High Court of Spain has suspended Glovo from the payment of €64 million. Glovo had appealed the payment of the fine which is a result of bogus self-employment. The €64 million are comprised of multiple settlement and sanction payments Glovo was previously ruled to deliver.

The background of this court ruling is that Glovo is in a difficult financial situation, including a loss of €209 million made in 2023. The platform warned that it would potentially face insolvency proceedings if it would have to pay the fine now, as it is facing liquidity problems, also due to Spanish banks having reduced or eliminated the credit offered to Glovo. Lastly, the stock value of Delivery-Hero, the multi-national which owns Glovo, has fallen, diminishing the extent to which Delivery-Hero could contribute to the payment of the €64 million.

7 March 2024

Glovo has now had a total of 12 fines suspended by national courts between November of 2023 and January 2024, amounting to €67,3 million in total.

It has been announced that Glovo will have to pay 10% interest on the fines, meaning that the final amount the platform will have to pay is over €70 million. Glovo also needs to provide the guarantee that it will be able to pay the fine in the future.

Additional metadata

Keywords: taxation, labour market segmentation, employment status
Actors: Platform, Government, Court
Sector: Transportation and storage
Platforms: Glovo

Sources

Glovo (30 January 2023)
The inspection fines Glovo 57 million for using false self-employed workers and 'riders' without a work permit (24 January 2023)
Judges suspend Glovo from a payment of 64 million euros due to its "extreme situation" (23 January 2024)
Glovo manages to defer fines for more than 67 million due to its financial difficulties (26 February 2024)

Basque Parliament condemns Glovo

Glovo, the Spanish headquartered food delivery company which is owned by German multi-national Delivery Hero, has been found to be operating in violation of the labour rights of platform workers. …
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