The label in your contract does not determine whether you are an employee in law.

The situation

An owner-driver delivered ready-mixed concrete for a concrete supplier under a written contract that called him an independent contractor. He had bought his own lorry on hire purchase and paid its running costs, and could arrange a substitute driver with the company's consent. The company still required him to wear its uniform, take reasonable orders from its staff, and use the lorry only for its deliveries. When the company stopped paying National Insurance contributionsA tax employers and employees pay on earnings, funding state benefits including the State Pension. A genuine tronc, run by a truly independent troncmaster, keeps tips outside employer National Insuran... on his behalf, the question of his real employment status reached the High Court.

What the court found

The High Court held that the driver was not an employee. The judgment set out a three-part test for a contract of service. First, the workerA legal category that sits between employee and self-employed. Workers are entitled to certain rights including national minimum wage, paid holiday, and protection from unlawful deduction from wages, ... has to agree to provide their own work and skill in return for pay. Second, the worker has to accept a sufficient degree of control from the other side. Third, the rest of the contract's terms have to fit with an employment relationship, not undo the first two conditions.

Here, the third condition was the sticking point. The driver owned the lorry and paid to run it. He also carried real financial risk if a job went wrong, and had a genuine right to arrange someone else to drive in his place. Those facts made this look like a business relationship rather than employment, so the court found he was self-employed under the National Insurance Act 1965, despite the uniform and the daily instructions.