A consultant who was hired as a freelance contractor, sought to be recognize as an employee, even though the engagement agreement was with the consultant's business.
The Court accepted the counsel's claim and held that indeed there was an employer-employee relationship between the parties. Being an employee is something close to status, and this status is not determined by the parties, but according to the circumstances of the matter as they are. The question as to the existence or absence of employment relations is determined by applying the "mixed test" the dominant component of which is the "integration test", composed of two sides: the positive side and the negative side. The negative side examines whether the employee has his own business, or more precisely, whether integration into the workplace was not done through his business. The fact that the employee had the potential for an independent business, but this potential was not realized, does not suffice to determine that he provided the services as part of his independent business and not as an "employee". Here, although the consultant was not strictly prohibited from providing services to additional clients, in practice the business had no additional clients during the entire period of the contract, and therefore it is not an independent business that provided the services, but rather the services were provided by an employee.