Processes that ask for employment bond, such as ‘pejotization’, grow 57% by 2024

In 2024, the Labor Court registered a total of 285,055 cases that call for the recognition of employment, according to data compiled by the Superior Labor Court (TST). The number represents a 57% increase compared to 2023 and reflects the growth of actions on the so -called “pejotization”. Under the argument of fraud to the labor relationship, professionals registered as a legal entity (PJ) or self -employed have gone to the Labor Court in search of the recognition of rights.

In 2025, only until February, 53,783 new cases were filed, which puts the theme in 16th in the ranking of those who take people most to the Labor Court. The full list consists of 1,881 themes. The number has been growing at least since 2018, excluding the drop recorded between 2020 and 2021 due to pandemic. In 2018, the subject still occupied the 40th in the ranking of the most recurrent, with 150,500 cases.

The growth coincides with the validity of the labor reform, promulgated in 2017, which began to allow the outsourcing of companies’ core activity. In 2018, this stretch of the reform was validated by the Supreme Federal Court (STF).

Last Monday, 14, Minister Gilmar Mendes until the Court gives a final word about the existence of bond. The decision was made in the context of an action involving the prudential insurer and, at origin, discussed the relationship between franchises and franchisees. The case had its general repercussion (ID) recognized last week, which means that the result should be followed by all courts in the country.

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Minister Gilmar Mendes justified the suspension based on the court overload caused by the high number of labor complaints. This is due to the divergent positions between the Labor Court and the supreme on the employment relationship. While labor judges tend to recognize this bond in several cases, the STF ministers have mostly decided in the opposite direction. As a result, many companies have appealed to the Supreme in an attempt to reverse convictions imposed by the Labor Court.

For part of the Labor Court, PJ contracts are being used to mask the employment relationship, so there would be fraud. In this analysis, the five requirements of the employment bond are considered: non -eventuality, subordination, burdens, personality and otherness. To recognize that there is fraud, the labor courts must identify the presence of these five criteria.

The Supreme, in turn, has overthrown these decisions on the grounds that the Court has already allowed the outsourcing of companies’ core activities in 2018. For the majority of the Court, the Constitution admits alternative employment contracts to the CLT.

In the decision, Gilmar stated that there is a “repeated refusal” by the Labor Court to apply the Supreme’s guidance on the subject.

The number of labor complaints arriving at the STF broke a record in 2024, when the court received 3,418 new processes of this type, a 76% increase compared to the previous year. In 2017, the year of approval of the Labor Reform in the government of Michel Temer (MDB), there were 277 actions.

“The judiciary is not aligned. We noticed a clear divergence,” says labor and business lawyer Antonio Vasconcellos Junior, founding partner of Avj Advogados. For him, the suspension determined by the Supreme Court has as a positive point the preservation of legal certainty in the midst of conflicting positions.

But the lawyer points out that the decision creates problems for the parties involved – both for workers, who should expect the outcome of proceedings indefinitely, and for companies, who will have their debts corrected by the Selic rate, currently at 14.25% per year.

Lawyers also report concerns about the emptying of Labor Court’s jurisdiction to analyze the actions on a case by case basis. In judging the subject with general repercussion, the Supreme must define a thesis that will standardize the understanding for the entire judiciary. It is expected to reduce the action space of labor judges.

Mauricio Corrêa da Veiga, partner of Corrêa da Veiga Advogados, considers that there is “reluctance” of some courts to follow the determinations of the Supreme Court, but points out that the “competence to evaluate the existence of fraud in hiring or the existence of an employment relationship, different from employment, can never be removed from labor justice”.

In an interview with Broadcast (Real -time news system of the State Group) In February 2024, Minister Gilmar Mendes said that the Labor Court is a “Brazilian peculiarity” and argued that the emptying of competences of this branch “is not the fault of the Supreme, life has changed, labor relations have changed”.

Cleber Venditti, partner of Mattos Filho and Professor of Occupational Law of Insper, points out that several precedents of the Supreme Court state that “there is no way to declare the recognition of the employment bond when there is a valid business contract and duly signed between the parties, especially when one of the parties is a high degree of intellect and considerable financial gain”. For him, the suspension of proceedings is a consequence of the “recalcity of labor justice to recognize” these precedents.

Fabiano Zavanella, partner of Rocha, Calderon and Associated Lawyers, evaluates that the stoppage of actions “does not benefit anyone” and will generate more concern for the parties. “The delay in the resolution ends up imposing costs of every order and nature, for the maintenance of actions, calculation of monetary correction, expectation of receipt of workers, disbursement of companies,” he says.

The expectation of those who follow the Supreme is that the court will reaffirm the position already externalized by the ministers and decide against the employment relationship. “The Supreme Court has already given signs of how it will judge, because nine ministers have repeatedly decided to not recognize the bond as a rule, and only two otherwise. I think here it will be no different,” says Zavanella.

In a statement, Prudential stated that the Superior Labor Court (TST) and the Supreme “have already ruled in more than 100 individual decisions for the validity of the franchise model.” “A collective definition has the potential to end an already outdated discussion in most labor courts, rationalizing funds from the country’s justice system and generating stimuli for franchise sector that already accounts for almost 3% of national GDP.”