Zero-hours contracts

Case 7: The facts

Nicole Wippel worked under a contract with no fixed hours: she was asked to work according to the workload, and could refuse the offer of work without having to justify it. Her employer's full-time workers had an agreement that set out their normal working hours.

Wippel argued that the failure to specify her hours of work was discriminatory against part-time workers and (because most part-time workers were women) also constituted indirect sex discrimination. The European Court of Justice (ECJ) was asked whether the European directives on part-time work and on equal treatment for men and women applied to her contract.

The ruling

The ECJ ruled that Wippel's contract did come within the scope of both directives. However, as the full-time workers had to work a fixed number of hours without the ability to refuse work, they were not comparable workers - so the terms of Wippel's contract were not discriminatory.

Wippel v Peek & Cloppenburg Case C-313/02