Professional Documents
Culture Documents
union members, including herin private respondent. When private respondent ratified the CBA
with the union, he not only agreed to the CBA but also agreed to conform to and abide by its
provisions. Thus, it cannot be said that he was illegally dismissed when the CBA provision on
compulsory retirement was applied to his case.
Providing in a CBA for compulsory retirement of employees after twenty-five (25) years of
service is legal and enforceable so long as the parties agree to be governed by such CBA. The
law presumes that employees know what they want and what is good for them absent any
showing that fraud or intimidation was employed to secure their consent thereto.
WHEREFORE, premises considered, the petition is GRANTED and the questioned Resolution is
hereby set aside. No costs.
On October 8,1983, Labor Arbiter dismissed the complaint for illegal dismissal as well as the
complaint for moral and exemplary damages but ordering the ICMC to pay Galang the sum of
P6,000.00 as payment for the last 3 months of the agreed employment period pursuant to her
verbal contract of employment.
Both parties appealed the decision to the NLRC. On August 22, 1985, the NLRC, by a majority
vote of Commissioners Guillermo C. Medina and Gabriel M. Gatchalian, sustained the decision
of the Labor Arbiter and dismissed both appeals for lack of merit. Dissatisfied,petitioner filed the
instant petition.
ISSUE:
Whether or not an employee who was terminated during the probationary period of her
employment is entitled to her salary for the unexpired portion of her six-month probationary
employment
HELD:
NO. Galang was terminated during her probationary period of employment for failure to qualify
as a regular member of petitioners teaching staff in accordance with its reasonable standards.
Galang was found by petitioner to be deficient in classroom management, teacher-student
relationship and teaching techniques. Failure to qualify as a regular employee in accordance with
the reasonable standards of the employer is a just cause for terminating a probationary employee
specifically recognized under Article 282 (now Article 281) of the Labor Code.
The labor arbiters decision is erroneous. The award of salary for the unexpired portion of the
probationary employment on the ground that a probationary employment for 6months is an
employment for a "definite period" which requires the employer to exhaust the entire
probationary period to give the employee the opportunity to meet the required standards.
A probationary employee is one who is on trial by an employer during which the
employer determines whether or not he is qualified for permanent employment. A
probationary appointment is made to afford the employer an opportunity to observe the
fitness of a probationer while at work, and to ascertain whether he will become a proper
and efficient employee. The word probationary,as used to describe the period of
employment, implies the purpose of the term or period, but not its length.
Being in the nature of a trial period the essence of a probationary period of
employment fundamentally lies in the purpose or objective sought to be attained by both
the employer and the employee during said period. The length of time is immaterial in
determining the correlative rights of both in dealing with each other during said period.
It is within the exercise of the right to select his employees that the employer may set or
fix a probationary period within which the latter may test and observe the conduct of the
former before hiring him permanently. As the law now stands, Article 281 of the Labor
Code gives ample authority to the employer to terminate a probationary employee for a
just cause or when he fails to qualify as a regular employee in accordance with
reasonable standards made known by the employer to the employee at the time of his
engagement. Nothing would preclude the employer from extending a regular or a
permanent appointment to an employee once the employer finds that the employee is
qualified for regular employment even before the expiration of the probationary period.
There was no showing, as borne out by the records, that there was circumvention of the
rights of Galang when she was informed of her termination. Her dismissal does not
appear to us as arbitrary, fanciful or whimsical. She was duly notified, orally and in
writing, that her services were terminated for failure to meet the prescribed standards of
The fact that Dr. Borja was not a full- time teacher, he could not have and did not
become a permanent employee even after the completion of three (3) years of service.
Hence, it correspondingly follows that there was no duty on the part of petitioner UST to
reappoint private respondent as Instructor, the temporary appointment having lapsed.
Such appointment is a matter addressed to the discretion of UST.
The Manual of Regulations for Private Schools which determines the acquisition of
regular or permanent status of faculty members in an educational institution
contemplates that it is not only the completion of three (3) years of service that is required to
acquire such status. Paragraph 75 of the Manual of Regulations for Private Schools states that:
75. Full time teachers who have rendered three consecutive years of satisfactory service shall be
considered permanent."
1) the teacher is a full time teacher;
2) the teacher must have rendered three (3) consecutive years of service; and
3) such service must have been satisfactory.
The Manual of Regulations also states that "a full-time teacher" is "one whose total working day
is devoted to the school, has no other regular remunerative employment and is paid on a regular
monthly basis regardless of the number of teaching hours" (Par. 77); and that in college, "the
nominal teaching load of a full-time instructor shall be eighteen hours a week" (par. 78).
It follows that a part-time member of the faculty cannot acquire permanence in employment
under the Manual of Regulations in relation to the Labor Code.
It cannot be said that respondent's total working day was devoted to the school alone. It is clear
from the record that he was practicing his profession as a doctor and maintaining a clinic in the
hospital for this purpose during the time that he was given a teaching load. In other words, he
had another regular remunerative work aside from teaching.
Therefore, Dr. Borja had to have other sources of income and the compensation for teaching
shows that he was no paid on a regular monthly basis.
It would appear that teaching was only a secondary occupation or "sideline," his professional
practice as a psychiatrist being his main vocation.
The record also discloses that he never had a normal teaching load of eighteen (18) hours a week
during the time that he was connected with the university.
Dr. Borjas sworn declaration is to effect that as affiliate faculty member of the Department of
Neurology and Psychiatry, private respondent had no teaching functions: that in fact, as affiliate
faculty he was merely an observer acquainting himself with functions of an instructor while
awaiting issuance of a normal appointment as such.
The private respondent, therefore, could not be regarded as a full- time teacher in any aspect. He
could not be regarded as such because his total working day was not devoted to the school and he
had other regular remunerative employment. Moreover, his average teaching load was only 6.33
hours a week.
Petition is granted.