Philippine Supreme Court Resolutions > Year 2011 > January 2011 Resolutions > [G.R. No. 175501 : January 10, 2011] MANILA WATER CO., INC. V. JOSE J. DALUMPINES, ET AL. :

Please take notice that the Court, Second Division, issued a Resolution dated 10 January 2011 which reads as follows:

G.R. No. 175501 (Manila Water Co., Inc. v. Jose J. Dalumpines, et al.). � This addresses respondents' Motion for Clarification^[1] of the Decision of the Court dated October 4, 2010. Respondents requested the Court to clarify "whether their separation pay shall be computed based on their actual length of service or shall include the time during which the case was pending until the finality of the Decision x x x to avoid any question that may arise therefrom during [the] execution proceeding[s] which may further delay the final and complete disposition of the case."

Sections 9 and 10 of the Omnibus Rules Implementing the Labor Code read:

Sec. 9. Termination pay. (a) An employee shall be entitled to termination pay equivalent to at least one month's salary for every year of service, a fraction of at least six months being considered as one whole year, in case of termination of his employment due to the installation of labor-saving devices or redundancy.

(b)    xxx.

(c)    The termination provided in the Section shall in no case be less
than the employee's one month pay.

Sec. 10. Basis of termination pay. The computation of the termination pay of an employee as provided herein shall be based on his latest salary rate, unless the same was reduced by the employer to defeat the intention of the Code, in which case the basis of computation shall be the rate before its deduction.

Based on the foregoing, in lieu of reinstatement, the separation pay of respondents who were illegally dismissed from service shall be computed based on the latest salary rate of the individual respondents, equivalent to at least a month's salary for every year of service, a fraction of at least six months shall be considered as one whole year. This means that the latest salary of the individual respondents shall be multiplied by the number of years that they have been in the actual employ of petitioner, and a fraction of at least six months shall be considered as one whole year. However, the computation of the individual respondents' separation pay shall only include the time that they were actually working for petitioner.

Their separation pay shall include all the earnings that the individual respondents were receiving at the time that they were in the employ of petitioner, including the fair and reasonable value of board, lodging, or other facilities customarily furnished by petitioner to its employees, in accordance with Article 97(f) of the Labor Code.^[2] Accordingly, allowances, bonuses, or any other remuneration granted by petitioner at the time respondents were employed shall be included in the computation of the separation pay of the individual respondents.

SO ORDERED.

Endnotes:

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^[1] Rollo, pp. 845-846.

^[2] Art. 97. Definition. - x x x.

(f) "Wage" paid to any employee shall mean the remuneration or earnings, however designated, capable of being expressed in terms of money, whether fixed or ascertained on a time, task, piece, or commission basis, or other method of calculating the same, which is payable by an employer to an employee under a written or unwritten contract of employment for work done or to be done, or for services rendered or to be rendered and includes the fair and reasonable value, as determined by the Secretary of Labor and Employment, of board, lodging, or other facilities customarily furnished by the employer to the employee. "Fair and reasonable value" shall not include any profit to the employer, or to any person affiliated with the employer.