The Migrating Workplace: Choice of Law in International Employment After Locatrans C-485/24
The Locatrans Decision: Determining Applicable Law in Cross-Border Employment Relationships Under the Rome Convention
The Court of Justice of the European Union’s December 11, 2025 judgment in Case C-485/24 Locatrans clarifies the methodology for identifying the law governing an employment contract when the employee’s habitual place of work shifts across national borders during the course of employment.
I. Introduction: The Challenge of Mobile Employment
Consider the paradigmatic case of an international truck driver who, over the span of several years, traverses the highways of multiple European Member States. His employment contract designates Luxembourg law as the governing law, and his employer maintains its registered office in Luxembourg. Yet as the years progress, an increasing proportion of his routes concentrate within French territory. At a certain juncture, the employer formally acknowledges that the driver performs more than half of his work in France and, consequently, must be enrolled in the French social security system. Shortly thereafter, the employment relationship terminates. Which legal regime—Luxembourg or French—determines this driver’s rights? The answer carries profound practical implications: it governs whether the dismissal was lawful and what remedies, if any, the employee may pursue.
The Court of Justice of the European Union confronted precisely this question in its judgment of December 11, 2025, in Case C-485/24 Locatrans, delivering guidance that will shape the landscape of international employment law in the transport sector and beyond for years to come.
II. Factual Background: From Luxembourg to France
ES, a French national, entered into an employment contract with Locatrans—a Luxembourg transport undertaking headquartered in Bettembourg—in October 2002, assuming the position of international driver with a monthly working time of 166 hours. The contract expressly designated Luxembourg law as the applicable law and enumerated Germany, the Benelux countries, Italy, Spain, Portugal, and Austria as the principal territories for ES’s transport activities.
Over the ensuing years, however, ES’s work gradually became concentrated in France. The decisive moment arrived in March 2014, when Locatrans itself formally acknowledged this state of affairs. In correspondence dated March 31, 2014, the employer invoked its obligation to register ES with the French social security system, confirming that more than fifty percent of his work was performed on French territory.
In January 2014, Locatrans had proposed reducing ES’s weekly working hours to thirty-five, equivalent to 151.55 hours monthly, effective July 16, 2014. ES declined to accept this modification. By letter dated April 17, 2014, Locatrans confirmed the termination of ES’s employment contract, effective July 16, 2014, citing his refusal to consent to the reduction in working time.
III. Procedural History: Divergent Approaches to the Same Contract
ES challenged the termination before the conseil de prud’hommes (labor tribunal) in Dijon, France, on January 8, 2015. The court of first instance dismissed his claims, applying Luxembourg law—the law expressly selected by the parties in their contract. Under Luxembourg law, the termination was held to be valid.
The Cour d’appel de Dijon (Court of Appeal of Dijon) adopted a fundamentally different analytical framework. Invoking Article 6 of the Rome Convention of 1980—the instrument constraining party autonomy in employment contracts to protect the weaker contractual party—the appellate court observed that a choice of law made by the parties cannot deprive the employee of the protection afforded by the mandatory rules of the law that would apply absent such choice. Given that ES habitually performed his work in France, as the employer itself had acknowledged, French protective provisions ought to govern. Accordingly, the court of appeal characterized the termination as an unjustified dismissal and awarded damages.
Locatrans filed a pourvoi en cassation (appeal in cassation). The Cour de cassation (Court of Cassation), perceiving an interpretive question requiring resolution at the European level, referred a preliminary question to the CJEU.
IV. The Legal Problem: When the Place of Work Migrates
The Rome Convention—now superseded by the Rome I Regulation for contracts concluded after December 17, 2009—employs the concept of the State “in which the employee habitually carries out his work” as the primary connecting factor for determining the applicable law in the absence of party choice. Where, however, an employee performs work across multiple States throughout the duration of employment, CJEU jurisprudence (notably the Koelzsch and Voogsgeerd judgments of 2011) has developed a methodology for identifying this place: one must ascertain the State in which, or from which, the employee principally discharges his obligations toward the employer.
The Locatrans case introduces an additional variable: what transpires when the habitual place of work shifts during the course of the employment relationship? Should courts consider the entire duration of employment—which might implicate multiple States—or focus upon the most recent period, during which a new center of professional activity has crystallized?
This question was far from academic. The referring court observed that, in the context of jurisdiction under Article 5(1) of the Brussels Convention, the Court had held in Weber (2002) that the last place of work may be taken into account where the parties clearly intended it to become the new habitual place of work. Should analogous reasoning govern the determination of applicable law?
V. The Court’s Ruling: Hierarchy of Connecting Factors and the Role of the “Closer Connection” Analysis
The CJEU delivered a response that elegantly harmonizes textual fidelity to the Convention with a functional approach to employee protection.
First, the Court emphasized that the connecting factors enumerated in Article 6(2) of the Rome Convention establish a hierarchy. The primary connecting factor is the State in which the employee habitually carries out his work (subparagraph (a)). Only where this place cannot be identified does one proceed to the subsidiary connecting factor—the place of business through which the employee was engaged (subparagraph (b)).
Second—and herein lies the crux of the judgment—the Court observed that the language of Article 6(2)(a) contains no indication as to which period of the employment relationship should be considered. In the absence of such guidance, the entire employment relationship must be taken into account for purposes of this determination (paragraph 44 of the judgment). Where, however, the habitual place of work has shifted from one State to another during the course of that relationship, no single State can be identified under this connecting factor (paragraph 45).
In such circumstances, the Court indicated, reference must be made to the subsidiary connecting factor—namely, the place of business through which the employee was engaged (paragraph 54). Critically, however, the escape clause contained in Article 6(2) in fine assumes central importance.
Within the framework of this clause, the Court underscored, the place where the employee performed work during the final period of the contract’s execution, which was intended to become the new habitual place of work, constitutes a “relevant circumstance” (une circonstance pertinente) to be considered in the overall assessment of circumstances (paragraph 57). The Court did not, however, elevate this element to the status of an autonomous connecting factor—it remains one among several factors subject to evaluation by the national court.
VI. Practical Implications: Applying the Judgment
The Locatrans decision furnishes national courts with a structured analytical framework:
- Determine the habitual place of work across the entire duration of employment. Where a single State can be identified, that State’s law governs (subject to comparison with any law chosen by the parties to ensure no diminution of mandatory protections).
- Where the habitual place of work has shifted during employment and no single State can be identified when considering the entire employment relationship, the subsidiary connecting factor—the place of business through which the employee was engaged (Article 6(2)(b))—formally applies.
- Irrespective of the outcome of the foregoing analysis, examine the totality of circumstances to ascertain whether the contract exhibits a closer connection with another State (Article 6(2) in fine). At this stage, the court must weigh collectively:
- the last place where the employee habitually performed work, provided it was intended to become the new center of professional activity;
- the State in which the employee pays income taxes;
- affiliation with social security systems;
- the methodology for determining remuneration and other conditions of employment;
- all other relevant elements of the employment relationship.
No single element is determinative—the weight accorded to each depends upon the circumstances of the particular case.
- Where the comprehensive assessment leads to the conclusion that the contract exhibits a closer connection with a State other than that indicated by the connecting factors in subparagraphs (a) or (b), the law of that other State applies.
In Locatrans itself, the Court remanded the application of this test to the referring court, while explicitly identifying elements favoring French law: not merely the last habitual place of work, but also the employer’s acknowledged obligation to register the driver with the French social security system.
VII. Why the Court Declined to Follow Weber
The referring court expressly inquired whether the reasoning of Weber—which, in the jurisdictional context, permitted consideration of the last place of work—might apply by analogy. The CJEU answered in the negative, emphasizing the fundamental distinction between rules governing jurisdiction and choice-of-law rules.
Moreover, the Court identified a significant legislative detail: when the Brussels Convention was replaced by the Brussels I Regulation, the Union legislature explicitly added reference to the place where the employee “last habitually carried out his work” in the jurisdictional provisions (Article 19, now Article 21 of the Brussels I bis Regulation). By contrast, when the Rome Convention yielded to the Rome I Regulation, no analogous modification was introduced into the choice-of-law provisions. This deliberate omission militates against an expansive interpretation that would automatically privilege the last place of work in the choice-of-law context.
VIII. Broader Context: Protection of Mobile Workers
The Locatrans judgment situates itself within an established line of CJEU jurisprudence that interprets choice-of-law rules pertaining to employment contracts functionally, with due regard for the objective of protecting the weaker party to the employment relationship. The Court consistently reiterates that Article 6 of the Rome Convention (and its counterpart, Article 8 of the Rome I Regulation) aims to ensure application of the law of the State with which the work is most closely connected—for it is there that the employee discharges his economic and social functions, there that the business and political environment exerts its influence upon him, and there that protective norms ought to be observed.
Simultaneously, the Court remains attentive to the imperative of legal predictability. It therefore rejects approaches that would permit excessive manipulation of connecting factors. The “closer connection” clause—while affording flexibility—demands an objective assessment of the totality of circumstances, rather than unilateral designation by either party.
IX. Implications for Practice: Transport, Posting, and Remote Work
Although Locatrans concerned an international truck driver, its implications extend well beyond the transport sector. In an era of increasing worker mobility—cross-border postings, remote work performed from multiple States, relocations within corporate groups—the question of applicable law for employment relationships assumes ever-greater urgency.
The judgment provides particularly valuable guidance in circumstances where:
- an employee gradually transfers the center of professional activity to another State;
- the employer itself acknowledges the change in place of work (for instance, through enrollment in a foreign social security system);
- formal or de facto modification of employment conditions occurs.
In such cases, courts must carefully examine whether the prerequisites for invoking the “closer connection” clause are satisfied—and the last stabilized place of work will carry substantial weight in that inquiry.
X. Conclusion
Case C-485/24 Locatrans constitutes a significant contribution to the mosaic of European private international law governing employment. The Court confirms that protection of mobile workers is not hostage to a formal choice of law made in the contract—yet simultaneously requires national courts to undertake a careful, multifaceted analysis of the actual circumstances of employment. In a world where work increasingly transcends borders, such an approach appears not merely doctrinally elegant but socially indispensable.
Related CJEU Jurisprudence:
- Koelzsch, Case C-29/10, Judgment of March 15, 2011
- Voogsgeerd, Case C-384/10, Judgment of December 15, 2011
- Schlecker, Case C-64/12, Judgment of September 12, 2013
- Weber, Case C-37/00, Judgment of February 27, 2002
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