Hostile and unreasonable

This is another case involving an employee placed in a situation where he felt compelled to give up his position, thus raising the issue of whether there was resignation or dismissal.

This case is about Mike, a bank manager in a southern city where he and his family are residing. When major depositors started making huge withdrawals from the branch due to news reports about anomalies involving high ranking officials of the bank, Mike approached Ben who was the bank’s Visayas-Mindanao area head to discuss how to resolve the problem. Ben however told Mike to just brush it aside as it was not a big problem.

But Mike was still very much concerned hence he requested one of the bank’s known big depositors who happens to be the Mayor of a nearby town to talk to Ben. Mike’s move was however misinterpreted by Ben as a form of threat. So the following day Ben angrily confronted Mike and accused the latter of seeking support from the Mayor. He told Mike that he cannot be threatened even if all these depositors immediately pull out their deposits and thus informed Mike right then and there that he will see to it that Mike would be replaced as he himself would manage the branch or place it under the Luzon Area Head so that he will have nothing to do anymore with said branch.

And true enough Ben went to the branch a week later with Mike’s replacement. He then instructed Mike to go to the head office and report to Larry who was the Vice President and Head of the Branch Banking Division. So Mike had to fly to Manila as ordered where Larry told him that he would undergo training. But no such training took place. Instead he was made to do clerical jobs. And since he was just staying in a rented house far from the head office, at least half of his travel and living expenses were consumed by daily 4 hour commuting. So after three months of work in the head office, Mike had to tender his resignation and subsequently filed a complaint for illegal constructive dismissal.

The bank however insisted that Mike voluntarily resigned and was not constructively dismissed. They contended that his transfer was not done unceremoniously and was not motivated by bad faith but pursuant to a valid order to undergo Branch Head Training for gross inefficiency. Furthermore, they claimed that his transfer did not entail any change in rank and compensation and was in accordance with his employment contract under which he can be given a different assignment anytime. In fact after his branch training he was assigned to a task force in charge of reconciling all book entries of all the branches, the bank contended. Was the bank correct?

No. In constructive dismissal cases, the employer has the burden of proving that the transfer of an employee is for valid and legitimate grounds such as genuine business necessity. The employer must be able to show that such transfer is not unreasonable, inconvenient or prejudicial to its employee. Failure to discharge this burden makes the employee’s transfer a constructive dismissal.

In this case, the bank failed to discharge this burden.  Its combination of harsh actions rendered Mike’s employment condition hostile and unbearable. First of all it failed to show any urgency or genuine necessity to transfer Mike who was able to prove the actual motive and bad faith behind his transfer by virtue of the bank’s failure show that he had a record of gross inefficiency.

Secondly, Mike’s transfer is clearly unreasonable, inconvenient and oppressive since Mike and his family, are residents of another city in the south. He was placed in the very difficult predicament of having to choose between living away from his family or bringing them to Manila which entails additional expenses.

Third, there was no valid reason why it had to require Mike to go to the Head Office for branch training when it could just have required him to undertake the same training in the Vis-Min area.

And finally, there was nothing in the order of transfer as to what position Mike would occupy after his training thereby effectively placing him on a “floating status”. His assignment to a position that entails reconciling of book entries for all branches which is essentially an accounting task is totally different from the alleged branch training he was made to undergo.

Based on these factual considerations, Mike was indeed constructively and illegally dismissed because of the hostile and unreasonable working conditions in the bank. He should be reinstated to his former position without loss of seniority and with back wages (Philippine Veterans bank vs. NLRC and Martinez , G.R. 188882, March 30, 2010)

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