The exclusion of "contract of service" and "contract of employment" from the Act's scope is the line that keeps freelancer engagements outside the employee framework while still binding them by statute. Until 31 March 2026, the floor of a freelancer engagement was whatever the parties wrote into the contract. From 31 March 2026, the Gig Workers Act 2025 supplies that floor by operation of law.
Four pillars in this issue, in order: what a service agreement under the Act must now contain; where the typical corporate template is now void by operation of law; how the Schedule's nine service categories catch SMEs and creative-sector businesses today; and the four-step dispute chain — from the internal grievance mechanism to the Gig Workers Tribunal, with appeal to the High Court within fourteen days. Each runs into a corporate template that was not drafted to absorb it.
The contract still binds; it is no longer the only document that does. The corporate that signed a freelancer service agreement before 31 March 2026 has not been released from it — it has had a statutory layer added on top, and where the contract sits below that layer, the contract gives way.