Italian Legislative Decree no. 25/17 was published on 17th March 2017. Through just two articles it has repealed the possibility of accessory work and reintroduced a regime of “full” liability in independent contracts between client and contractor.
In particular, Articles 48, 49 and 50 of Legislative Decree 81/15, which provided for accessory work and the related payment through the so-called “vouchers”, have been repealed. Vouchers may no longer be purchased, and those which have already been bought will have to be used before the end of this year.
The Decree has also virtually repealed all the client’s guarantees not to be sentenced to pay pension, remuneration and insurance schemes accrued by employees and not paid by their employer (contractor) as jointly and severally liable under Article 29 Legislative Decree 276/03.
Therefore, the client ‒who is held jointly and severally liable with the contractor for the aforesaid debts‒ will no longer be able to enjoy the so-called “benefit to collect from the debtor first” which allowed the client to avoid or at least postpone the payment of the debt. In fact, the entitled person was previously forced to exhaust the contractor’s assets and ‒only later and if unsuccessful‒ that of the client.
Furthermore, the Decree-Law has excluded the possibility (which was not really used much anyway) by collective bargaining to set forth manner and control procedures of the regularity of the contracts with the purpose of holding the client harmless in respect of any liability.
We now only have to wait and see if the new regime ‒which is definitely more costly for some enterprises‒ will be converted into ordinary law within the next 60 days.
(Milan Office – Marcello Giordani – 0039 (0)239680538)
