REPSE enforcement record: what the authorities and courts have actually done
See the fines the STPS, the SAT and the IMSS have actually imposed, the rulings that settled the 2021 reform, and what companies have told their investors. Measure your risk by what has happened, not only by the range the law allows.
What was fined in 2024
Performance audit 2024-0397 by Mexico's Federal Audit Office (Auditoría Superior de la Federación, in Spanish) is the only official source that publishes the amounts of subcontracting sanctions. Its 2024 figures:
MXN 4,744.8 million
assessed by the SAT in 2024 against taxpayers with a REPSE registration. The STPS imposed MXN 235.3 million in labor fines the same year.
| SAT, assessments | MXN 4,744.8M | |
|---|---|---|
| IMSS, presumed unpaid contributions | MXN 259.0M | |
| STPS, fines on clients and providers | MXN 235.3M |
| Authority | What it reviewed | Result | Amount |
|---|---|---|---|
| SAT (tax authority) | 1,547 audits of 1,436 taxpayers with a current REPSE registration | 1,057 fines | MXN 4,744.8 million assessed |
| STPS (labor ministry) | 16,230 inspection visits to companies receiving the services (clients) | 188 sanction rulings | MXN 96.3 million |
| STPS | 3,634 inspection visits to providers | 47 sanction rulings | MXN 19.0 million |
| STPS | 120 cases where the inspection was obstructed (97 by clients, 23 by providers) | 79 sanction rulings | MXN 120.0 million |
| IMSS (social security) | 202 subcontracting audits | Presumed unpaid contributions | MXN 259.0 million |
| IMSS | Providers that were warned and then paid to get a clean compliance opinion and keep their registration | 3,414 providers | MXN 71.1 million |
Three readings. First, the STPS sanctioned four clients for every provider. Of the 188 clients sanctioned, 163 had no written contract and 89 used a provider without a REPSE registration. Second, obstructing the inspection cost the most, about MXN 1.5 million per ruling, and eight in ten of those cases were clients. Third, the big money is tax. The SAT assessed almost fifty times what the STPS fined clients.
The proportion matters too: of the 16,230 visits to clients, 54.7% met every condition checked and 1.2% ended in a sanction. The labor fine is rare. What is common is the tax audit and the provider losing its registration.
What has happened since
| Date | Event | Source |
|---|---|---|
| June 30, 2026 | 156,717 active registrations. In the period, 6,970 registered companies were warned about their social-security obligations and 792 registrations were cancelled for non-compliance, on top of 30,853 cancelled for not renewing. | STPS, Avance y Resultados 2025-2026, in Spanish, p. 16 |
| March 2026 | IMSS payment software SUA 3.7.1 adds document type "05 Responsabilidad Solidaria del 15A": collecting a provider's unpaid contributions from the client, as jointly liable party, now has its own payment channel. | IDC, March 3, 2026, in Spanish |
| December 2025 | The full bench of the Federal Administrative Court (TFJA) holds that no interim measure may restore a cancelled REPSE registration while the case is litigated (binding precedent IX-J-SS-156, 11 votes to 0). | TFJA thesis search, in Spanish |
| November 2025 | The STPS publishes its subcontracting inspection protocol (dated September 2025), with visits to providers and to clients. | STPS protocol, in Spanish |
| July 2025 | The STPS and IMSS warn 14,455 REPSE-registered companies to meet their social-security obligations, after 34,302 in February 2024 and 22,352 in January 2025. | STPS press release, in Spanish |
| 2024 | The STPS cancels 45,410 registrations in the year. Between 68% and 70% of providers did not file the ICSOE report, which is due every four months. | ASF, audit 2024-0397 |
Registry figures by year and by state are in REPSE in numbers.
What the courts have ruled
The companies that challenged the reform lost. In 2023 the Second Chamber of the Supreme Court (SCJN) upheld it in a series of binding precedents, and labor courts began bringing the client into lawsuits filed by its provider's workers.
| Court and case | Thesis | Holding |
|---|---|---|
| SCJN, Second Chamber, amparo en revisión 674/2022 (July 2023) | 2a./J. 94/2023, in Spanish | The client's joint liability for its provider's labor and social-security obligations is constitutional. |
| SCJN, Second Chamber, amparo en revisión 687/2022 (June 2023) | 2a./J. 91/2023, in Spanish | Registration and the reports to IMSS and INFONAVIT (LFT 15, LSS 15-A, INFONAVIT Law 29 Bis) are reasonable and proportionate. |
| SCJN, Second Chamber, amparo en revisión 564/2022 (July 2023) | 2a./J. 83/2023, in Spanish | Requiring the provider to be current with tax and social security in order to register is valid. |
| SCJN, Second Chamber, amparo en revisión 81/2023 (July 2023) | 2a./J. 95/2023, in Spanish | The ban on supplying personnel (LFT 12) does not violate legal certainty. |
| SCJN, Second Chamber, amparo en revisión 23/2023 (September 2023) | 2a./J. 87/2023, in Spanish | Investment treaties do not shield a foreign investor from the ban. |
| SCJN, Second Chamber, amparo en revisión 538/2023 (September 2023) | 2a. V/2023, in Spanish (non-binding, 3 votes to 2) | The STPS may not demand proof of "specialized character" to grant a registration. It is the only ruling in a company's favor, and it is not binding. |
| SCJN, Second Chamber, amparo en revisión 633/2023 (April 2024) | 2a./J. 66/2024, in Spanish | The cap on employee profit sharing (three months' pay or the three-year average) is valid. |
| Regional Labor Plenary, Central-South Region, contradicción 53/2023 | PR.L.CS. J/23 L, in Spanish | No suspension is available against the STPS subcontracting inspection criteria. |
| Fifth Collegiate Labor Court, First Circuit (Mexico City) | I.5o.T. J/2 L, in Spanish | Where there are signs of subcontracting and the defendant denies the employment relationship, objective indications are enough for the worker. |
| Same court, amparo directo 424/2022 | I.5o.T.37 L, in Spanish (non-binding) | If the claim shows signs of unjustified subcontracting, the labor court must direct the worker to bring in every company that may be liable. |
| Same court, amparo directo 700/2022 | I.5o.T.41 L, in Spanish (non-binding) | If the client uses the work, a third party pays the wages and nothing proves a specialized service, all of them are jointly liable. |
Theses marked "J" are binding precedent (jurisprudencia) on the courts the law names. Non-binding theses (aisladas) guide other courts, which may rule differently. The 2023 Supreme Court theses are collected in the Second Chamber's January 2024 compilation, in Spanish.
What companies have told their investors
The STPS does not publish the names of the companies it sanctions. The named cases are in the reports companies file with the US Securities and Exchange Commission.
| Company | What it reported | Filing |
|---|---|---|
| Volaris and Viva Aerobus | In their business combination agreement (December 18, 2025) each party represents that its specialized-service providers comply with the subcontracting restrictions and, where required, keep a current REPSE registration. | Exhibit 4.30, SEC |
| FEMSA | 2022 annual report: the reform bars deducting outsourcing expenses and crediting their VAT, and in extreme cases outsourcing of personnel may qualify as tax fraud. Profit sharing paid to employees went up. | Form 20-F, SEC |
| Grupo Aeroportuario Centro Norte (OMA) | 2021 annual report, risk factor: if subcontractors at its airports do not register their employees with IMSS and INFONAVIT, OMA is jointly liable for the contributions and penalties. | Form 20-F, SEC |
| Kansas City Southern de México | Merged its staffing company into the railroad in July 2021 because of the reform. Cost of the reform in 2021: about USD 8 million in compensation. | Form 10-K, SEC |
| Banco Santander México | Second quarter of 2022: salaries and benefits up 11.2%, MXN 456 million, "due to the insourcing of employees". | Form 6-K, SEC |
Related labor cases
This case is not a REPSE fine. It is a freedom-of-association review under the USMCA Rapid Response Labor Mechanism, another route by which an authority examines labor relations at an operation in Mexico.
| Date | Event | Source |
|---|---|---|
| May to August 2026 | Minera Peñasquito (Newmont, Zacatecas). On May 13, 2026 the miners' union (Los Mineros) filed a petition under the Mechanism; on June 12 the United States asked Mexico to review whether workers at Newmont Minera Peñasquito, S.A. de C.V. were being denied freedom of association and collective bargaining. In August the STPS reviewed three dismissals and the governments of Mexico and the United States agreed a remediation plan: a union neutrality letter, a confidential complaint channel, training, and dialogue tables between the company and the union. USTR has published no resolution: the case is in remediation. Separately, in June 2026 the mine paid MXN 3,358 million in profit sharing (PTU), the full 10% of profits. | USTR, June 12, 2026; DOL; Infobae, August 6, 2026, in Spanish; Zócalo, August 7, 2026, in Spanish; Mine Academy, in Spanish; Expansión, June 5, 2026, in Spanish; ByShovel analysis |
What does not exist yet
- A ruling on the lost deduction. We found no thesis from 2021 to date deciding whether denying the income-tax deduction or the VAT credit for paying a provider without REPSE is valid. That risk comes from the statute (LISR 27-V, LIVA 5-II) and from SAT notices, which since 2025 warn clients of cancelled providers. The details are in the proof-of-service guide.
- A public list of sanctioned companies. The STPS publishes totals, not names, and the REPSE portal looks up one company at a time. There is no downloadable list of cancelled registrations.
- A criminal conviction for a simulated subcontracting scheme. The law treats it as aggravated tax fraud (CFF 108). We found no published conviction.
What the law allows the authorities to impose, conduct by conduct, is in the REPSE fines guide.