PBS vs Secretary

Private respondent Jandeleon Juezan filed a complaint against

petitioner with the Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE)
Regional Office No. VII, Cebu City, for illegal deduction, nonpayment of
service incentive leave, 13th month pay, premium pay for holiday and
rest day and illegal diminution of benefits, delayed payment of wages
and noncoverage of SSS, PAG-IBIG and PhilHealth.

DOLE Regional Director found that private respondent was an

employee of petitioner, and was entitled to his money claims.
Petitioner sought reconsideration of the Director's Order, but failed.

Under Art. 129 of the Labor Code, the power of the DOLE and its duly
authorized hearing officers to hear and decide any matter involving the
recovery of wages and other monetary claims and benefits was
qualified by the proviso that the complaint not include a claim for
reinstatement, or that the aggregate money claims not exceed
PhP5,000. The only qualification to this expanded power of the DOLE
was only that there still be an existing employer-employee
relationship.

Under Art. 128 (b) of the Labor Code, as amended by RA 7730, the first
sentence reads, "Notwithstanding the provisions of Articles 129 and
217 of this Code to the contrary, and in cases where the relationship of
employer-employee still exists, the Secretary of Labor and
Employment or his duly authorized representatives shall have the
power to issue compliance orders to give effect to the labor standards
provisions of this Code and other labor legislation based on the
findings of labor employment and enforcement officers or industrial
safety engineers made in the course of inspection." It is clear and
beyond debate that an employer-employee relationship must exist for
the exercise of the visitorial and enforcement power of the DOLE.

Although determination of ee-er relationship is primarily within the

power of the nlrc, employee, the DOLE must have the power to
determine whether or not an employer-employee relationship exists,
and from there to decide whether or not to issue compliance orders in
accordance with Art. 128 (b) of the Labor Code, as amended by RA
7730. This is because no law prohibits the DOLE from doing as such.

Although the determination of the said relationship by DOLE is to be

respected by lower administrative agencies, it may still be questioned.
A remedy for the questionable determination would be a petition for
certiorari under the Rules of Court. On the other hand, should DOLE
make the determination that no employer-employee relationship
exists, it divests itself of jurisdiction over the case.

Yanson vs Secretary

Mardy Cabigo and 40 other workers filed with the DOLE a request for payroll inspection 4 of Hacienda
Valentin Balabag owned by Alberta Yanson. The investigation of DOLE Bacolod found non-payment
of remunerations of employees and failure of the employer to provide for contributions. A compliance
order was then issued directing Yanson to pay each employee P9,084.00 and to submit proof of
payment thereof. It also required petitioner to correct existing violations of occupational safety and
health standards. Yanson filed an appeal with the DOLE against the compliance order with a
corresponding bond worth P1,000 based on her capacity. The appeal was denied due to
insufficiency of the amount of bond. A writ of execution was issued against the deposits and chattels
of Yanson to further the compliance order. Yanson opposed the writ arguing a violation of due
process.

Issue: Whether the right to due process of Yanson was violated for not being informed of the writ of
execution issued in accordance with the compliance order.

Ruling: No. The practice of reduction of bond applies only in the NLRC. Insufficiency of bonds
concerning an appeal before the DOLE will result to imperfection of appeal as implied in Art 128 of
the LC. The Court provides that incapacity of the appellant to meet the cash bond may resort to a
surety bond to comply with the requirement of bonds. Therefore, the right to due process of Yanson
was not violated as there is no perfected appeal due to failure to comply with the required bond.

Star Paper vs Simbol

Star Paper is engaged in the business of paper products. Ronaldo SImbol and Alma Dayrit are
employees of Star Paper. They eventually decided to marry each other. Josephine Ongsitco
advised the couple that should they decide to get married, one of them
should resign pursuant to a company policy. Similar cases occurred with Wilfreda
Comia, and Lorna Estrella. Ongsitco claims that the three respondents resigned voluntarily. The
latter claims otherwise as they were compelled to resign in accordance with the company policy
prohibiting marriage amongst employees. They claim that their refusal of resignation resulted to the
refusal of Star Paper to release their 13th month pays.

Issue: Whether the policy providing for prohibition on marriage

amongst employees was valid

Ruling: No. Art 136 of the LC provides that it shall be unlawful for an
employer to require as a condition of employment or continuation of
employment that a woman employee shall not get married, or to stipulate
expressly or tacitly that upon getting married a woman employee shall be
deemed resigned or separated, or to actually dismiss, discharge,
discriminate or otherwise prejudice a woman employee merely by reason
of her marriage. However, a bona fide occupational qualification
justifies an employer's no-spouse rule. To justify a bona fide
occupational qualification, the employer must prove two factors:

(1) that the employment qualification is reasonably related to the

essential operation of the job involved; and,
(2) that there is a factual basis for believing that all or substantially all
persons meeting the qualification would be unable to properly perform
the duties of the job.

An example of justification limiting the employment of employees

in consideration of marriage is prohibition of marriage by one
employee to the employee of a competitor company in the
pharmaceutical industry. The requirement of reasonableness must be
clearly established to uphold the questioned employment policy. The
employer has the burden to prove the existence of a reasonable
business necessity. In the present case, Star Paper failed to prove a
reasonable cause for the existence of the policy prohibiting inter-
marriage among its employees. Therefore, the policy providing for
prohibition on marriage amongst employees was invalid as the
employer failed to reasonably justify its existence in its line of
business.

Domingo vs Rayala

Basic in the law of public officers is the three-fold liability rule, which states that the wrongful acts or
omissions of a public officer may give rise to civil, criminal and administrative liability. An action for
each can proceed independently of the others.43 This rule applies with full force to sexual
harassment.

Since SH is an administrative offense for immoral conduct, in relation to “other causes as provided
by law”, the proper penalty would be 6 month suspension for the first offense.

Aeolus Case

Rosalinda Cortez was served a memorandum to explain why she should not be punished for
throwing a stapler at her manager William Chua and uttering invectives against him. In addition to
this incident, she was required to explain non-payment of entrusted funds to a Mr. Fang as well as a
dubious time-in made through a co-employee. Cortez refused to answer the said inquiries. She was
then placed under suspension while the management investigated the circumstances
aforementioned.

A second memorandum to explain was served to cortez which inquires why she failed to process the
ATM applications of 9 of her co-employees. Eventually, Cortez was informed of her termination on
grounds of gross and habitual neglect of duties, serious misconduct
and fraud or willful breach of trust. Cortez alleged that the instance of
her throwing a stapler to Chua was due to sexual harassments of the
latter against him.

Issue: Whether the acts of Cortez are justifiable due to alleged sexual
harassment

Ruling: Yes. The gravamen of the offense in sexual harassment is not

the violation of the employee's sexuality but the abuse of power by the
employer. Any employee, male or female, may rightfully cry "foul"
provided the claim is well substantiated. Strictly speaking, there is no
time period within which he or she is expected to complain through the
proper channels.
LBC vs Palco

One of the ways by which a hostile or offensive work environment is created is through the sexual
harassment of an employee.

Workplace sexual harassment occurs when a supervisor, or agent of an employer, or any other
person who has authority over another in a work environment, imposes sexual favors on another,
which creates in an intimidating, hostile, or offensive environment for the latter. Section 3 of Republic
Act No. 7877, otherwise known as the Anti-Sexual Harassment Act, states: