What is a labor case?

Certified labor disputes are cases certified to the Commission for compulsory arbitration
by the Secretary of Labor and Employment if in his opinion, there exists a labor dispute
causing or likely to cause a strike or lockout in an industry indispensable to the national
interest. (

An action for illegal dismissal prescribes in four (4) years from accrual of cause of action.

SC: Failure to Disclose Previous Employment Not a Ground for

Dismissal
September 21, 2022

The Supreme Court has ruled that omission of past employment is not a just cause to
terminate an employment.

In a Decision penned by Justice Henri Jean Paul B. Inting, the Court’s Third Division
granted the petition of Nancy Claire Pit Celis to reverse and set aside the Decision dated
June 7, 2019 and the Resolution dated December 6, 2019 of the Court of
Appeals (CA). The assailed CA rulings reversed and set aside the Decision dated July
13, 2018 and the Resolution dated October 26, 2018 of the National Labor Relations
Commission (NLRC), and held that Celis’ employer, Bank of Makati (A Savings Bank),
Inc. (Bank of Makati), validly dismissed Celis.

Petitioner Celis was hired on July 15, 2013 as an Account Officer of Bank of Makati’s
Pasay City Branch. On May 23, 2016, the bank assigned her to its Legal and External
Agency Department as an Administrative Officer.

By the end of 2017, the Bank of Makati’s Human Resource Department received a
report that Celis was previously employed in the Rural Bank of Placer (Bank of Placer),
Surigao del Norte and was involved in a case concerning embezzlement of funds. Celis
did not disclose this past employment when she applied for a job with the Bank of
Makati.

After an investigation and hearing, Celis was dismissed for violating the Bank of
Makati’s Code of Conduct and Discipline (Bank’s Code of Conduct), for “knowingly
giving false or misleading information in applications for employment as a result of
which employment is secured.” Celis’s employment was also terminated on the ground
of “serious misconduct, fraud, or willful breach of trust and loss of confidence” under
the Labor Code.

This prompted Celis to file a Complaint for illegal dismissal, monetary claims, and
damages against the Bank of Makati. She maintained that the omission of her past
employment with the Bank of Placer was done in good faith and that the Bank of Makati
failed to prove her involvement in the embezzlement case.

The Labor Arbiter (LA)  ruled in favor of Celis and held that she was illegally dismissed,
holding that her failure to state her past employment was not a serious offense that
would justify suspension and termination. The LA also noted that Celis was never
administratively found guilty of the supposed charge of embezzlement against the Rural
Bank of Placer, which allowed her to resign without any derogatory record.

The LA’s ruling was upheld by the NLRC, but was subsequently overturned by the CA.

In reversing the CA, the Supreme Court stressed the Constitutional policy that
whenever there are doubts in the interpretation of labor legislation and contracts, the
former should be resolved in favor of labor.

In Celis’ case, considering that she did not actually state any false information in her
job application but merely omitted to reflect her past employment with the Bank of
Placer, she could not have committed the alleged infraction of allegedly violating the
Bank’s Code of Conduct for concealing her previous employment.

“The labor tribunals aptly held that this is merely a case of an omission to disclose
former employment in a job application, a fault which does not justify petitioner’s
suspension and eventual termination from employment… [T]he penalty must be
commensurate to the offense involved and to the degree of the infraction. To dismiss
petition on account of her omission to disclose former employment is just too harsh a
penalty,” the Court said.