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There is a logic present in many business decisions: reduce costs in the short term to maintain operations.

The problem arises when this reduction is based on legal shortcuts. What appears to be immediate savings tends to turn into exponential debt in the medium and long term.

Informal time banks are a recurring example. The practice seems simple, but without a valid agreement, adequate control, and compliance with legal limits, it has no legal effect.

When challenged in court, the result is usually the recognition of overtime accumulated over years, with repercussions on vacation pay, 13th-month salary, FGTS, and fines. The projected savings disappear in the face of a structured liability.

The creation of fictitious positions of trust follows the same logic. The title does not remove the right to overtime when there is no real autonomy, decision-making power, and effective management. The Labor Court analyzes the function performed, not the nomenclature. When the classification is removed, the suppressed amounts return with charges, interest, and adjustments.

These practices rarely stem from bad faith. In general, they arise from urgency, a lack of technical guidance, and the perception that formalization is costly. However, labor liabilities do not grow in a linear fashion. They multiply, generate chain reactions, and materialize in a concentrated manner, with a direct impact on cash flow and equity.

The need for legal structuring tends to intensify in the short term. There are relevant discussions underway in the Superior Labor Court on the limits of individual negotiation in relation to collective rules, the validity of direct adjustments that remove rights provided for in agreements, and the criteria for characterizing positions of trust.

In the Federal Supreme Court, debates are advancing on the financial liability of partners and administrators in labor enforcement, equal pay in economic groups, and the social security impacts of certain amounts recognized by the courts.

These are issues that directly relate to decisions made today in people management. Informal practices, which appear to provide security in everyday life, can become highly costly in light of understandings that are becoming consolidated.

False labor savings do not come cheap. They become unsustainable over time. And they compromise not only financial results, but also the predictability, governance, and sustainability of the business.

Por Pedro Chicarino