Stefan Sagel specialises in employment law and employee benefits. He represents clients in individual and collective labour law matters, including dismissal, collective bargaining, transfer of undertaking, industrial action and co-determination. An important focus of his practice is litigation before the Supreme Court of the Netherlands, where he has represented companies, individual employees, as well as trade unions in several landmark cases.

Stefan regularly works closely together with other De Brauw practice groups, particularly in outsourcing matters, as well as the employment implications of competition law infringements. 

Recent work includes

• eliciting two landmark rulings by the Supreme Court on unfair dismissal in which it was held (i) that a dismissal may not be found to be unfair solely because of the lack of a severance package and (ii) that no fixed formula may be used to assess damages for unfair dismissal. 
• representing the Hyatt group in successful Supreme Court litigation regarding the summary dismissal of an employee for the use of cocaine outside working hours
• eliciting a far-reaching ruling by the Supreme Court that employers are under a duty of care to take out adequate insurance for all employees who are requested to use a motor vehicle during working hours
• advising a multinational oil company, several pharmaceutical companies, a telecommunications company, as well as companies in the entertainment industry on different employment matters, including high-level dismissal cases

Chambers says: ‘A highly skilled and active Supreme Court litigator, Stefan Sagel "handles cases with a lot of flair."’

Stefan is an editor of various labour law journals. He regularly publishes in professional journals and newspapers on different employment law issues, lectures before the judiciary and the Netherlands Bar Association and is a deputy justice at the Court of Appeal in The Hague. Stefan won ILO's 2011 Client Choice Award for best Employment & Labour lawyer in the Netherlands.