co-employment

A relationship between two or more employers which involves having rights and obligations concerning the same employee for the same work, such as the relationship between a contract agency and one of its clients.

This study highlights not only the distortions introduced by legal concerns about the co-employment doctrine but also the complex relations that can emerge between regular employees and contractors, working side by side and yet separated by employment status, administrative/political, and cultural distance -- in this case, with tragic consequences.

However, in several of the conversations that I have had, the real issue was that the client did not understand their rights or how a contract security firm operated, and therefore they used the co-employment defense as an excuse.

An arrangement where two businesses effectively work as a single enterprise, thereby causing the parent company to incur legal liability and responsibility toward employees of the subsidiary company.

Overseas employees appear to be more aware of possible co-employment claims against US parent companies.

To consider the existence of co-employment, the judges found that the decision to restructure the subsidiary had been taken by the board of the parent company, that directors were common and that the main company was interfering in the management of the staff of its subsidiary.