THE Supreme Court has affirmed the decision of the Court of Appeals nullifying a Department of Labor and Employment resolution that ordered PLDT to regularize more than 7,000 workers of its service contractors.
But the Supreme Court said that workers performing installation, repair, and maintenance services are declared regular PLDT employees because they do tasks that are necessary, desirable, and directly related to the telecommunication company’s business.
DOLE Secretary Silvestre Bello III earlier directed PLDT to regularize 7,344 workers of its contractors, as he found that they were engaged in labor-only contracting,
Bello also ordered PLDT and its contractors to pay P51.8 million in monetary liability.
But the CA, in a July 2018 decision, nullified his resolution directing PLDT to to regularize the workers of its contractors for janitorial, messengerial, clerical, information technology, back office support, call center, sales, and other professional services.
The CA also said only the workers involved in installation, repair, and maintenance services should be regularized. It likewise directed the DOLE to review the monetary award that PLDT must pay.
In a February 14, 2024 decision written by Associate Justice Rodil Zalameda, the Supreme Court’s First Division upheld the CA ruling.
It said there was no basis for Bello’s finding that PLDT and its contractors were engaged in labor-only contracting.
It said Bello’s ruling that PLDT exercised control over its contractors’ employees was mostly based on its interview of the workers, supported by service agreements and other employment documents, as posted on abogado.com
But it said these were not substantial enough.
“While these interviews may have invited the DOLE’s attention to PLDT’s and its contractors’ potential violations, to rely heavily on these pieces of evidence to support its conclusion is to ignore basic evidentiary tenets and principles,” it said.
It said anecdotal evidence is “malleable” and can be made to fit any narrative.
Applying the DOLE’s findings of violations to 7,344 workers based on interviews with 1,000 workers is “venturing in speculation and guesswork,” it added.
“As mentioned, what is true for some may not be true for the rest. This conjectural method is indeed whimsical and arbitrary clearly indicating that the conclusions reached was tainted by grave abuse of discretion,” it said.
It further said that the DOLE could have done more to collect evidence to support the statements of the workers since it has the power to inspect the actual work being done by the contractors’ workers and the extent of PLDT’s involvement in their work, but such fact-finding was not conducted,.
The abogado.com said Supreme Court also upheld the CA’s ruling that personnel involved in installation, repair, and maintenance services should be regularized due because their work is directly related to PLDT’s business.
It rejected the telco’s argument that these workers may be considered project and seasonal employees, as there was no evidence to back up this claim.
“It cannot be denied that without the work performed by these employees, PLDT would not be able to carry on its business and deliver the services it promised its consumers,” it said.
But it also said regularization of these employees would entail factual consequences, and remanded the case to the DOLE National Capital Region and directed it to determine the effects of the regularization of these workers.
It likewise directed the DOLE to review, compute, and determine the monetary award on the labor standards violation that the PLDT and contractors must pay.
