NAGA CITY --- The National Labor Relations Commission sub-regional arbitration branch based in this city has ordered a local food service company here to pay the amount of P267,943 representing back wages and differentials of its three previously dismissed employees.
Executive Labor Arbiter Jose Del Valle, Jr. in his decision over a labor case against Graceland Food Industries, said his office found complainants Ariel San Buenaventura, Ferdinand de Hitta, and Oscar Fernandez, service crew and delivery drivers, respectively, to have been illegally dismissed in 2008. He also ordered the reinstatement of the complainants to their former positions.
Claims, however, for alleged daily wage underpayment, unfair labor practice and premium pay for holiday were found to be devoid of merit.
“With regard to the claim of complainant San Buenaventura for underpayment of wages, based on payrolls submitted by respondent for the year 2006, San Buenaventura’s hourly rate was P28.13 while under Wage Order no. 11, the hourly rate was P27.50,” the decision stated.
For 2007, the complainant’s hourly rate was P28.50 where the applicable rate was P28.25, the labor office further noted. In 2008 San Buenaventura was paid his hourly rate at P29.38 where the applicable rate at that time was P29.88, hence a wage differential in favor of the complainant was computed.
The complainants, records show, were dismissed allegedly for varied reasons, such as formation of a labor union, failure to report to work and comply with instructions, sleeping while on duty, and absence without leave.
The labor office’s decision reminded the respondent company that “past infractions for which an employee had been duly penalized cannot be taken collectively as a justification for dismissal from the service of the employee.”
It also emphasized that in the instant case, complainants were already penalized for whatever past offenses they could have committed and that respondents could not use the same offenses to justify their employees’ dismissal.
