Source: http://lawlibrary.chanrobles.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=83763:58111&catid=1589&Itemid=566
Timestamp: 2019-04-19 10:53:29+00:00

Document:
G.R. No. 198620, November 12, 2014 - P.J. LHUILLIER, INC. AND MARIO RAMON LUDEÑA, Petitioners, v. FLORDELIZ VELAYO, Respondent.
P.J. LHUILLIER, INC. AND MARIO RAMON LUDEÑA, Petitioners, v. FLORDELIZ VELAYO, Respondent.
Before this Court is a petition for review on certiorari1 under Rule 45 of the Decision2 dated June 30, 2011 of the Court of Appeals (CA) in CA-G.R. SP No. 03069, affirming the finding of the National Labor Relations Commission (NLRC) that respondent Flordeliz Velayo (respondent) was illegally dismissed. The Resolution3 dated September 14, 2011 denied the motion for reconsideration thereof.
On June 13, 2003, (herein petitioner) PJ (CEBU) LHUILLIER, INC. (PJ LHUILLIER for brevity) hired FLORDELIZ M. ABATAYO [sic] as Accounting Clerk at the LH-4, Cagayan de Oro City Branch with a basic monthly salary of P9,353.00. On February 9, 2008 appellant (herein private respondent) was served with a Show Cause Memo by MARIO RAMON LUDENA, Area Operations Manager of PJ Lhuillier (herein petitioner), ordering her to explain within 48 hours why no disciplinary action should be taken against her for dishonesty, misappropriation, theft or embezz[le]ment of company funds in violation of Item 11, Rule V of the Company Code of Conduct. Thereafter, (s)he was placed under preventive suspension from February 9 to March 8, 2008 while her case was under investigation.
The charges against the appellant (herein private respondent) were based on the Audit Findings conducted on October 29, 2007, where the overage amount of P540.00 was not reported immediately to the supervisor, not recorded at the end of that day.
On February 11, 2008, complainant (herein private respondent) submitted her reply and admitted that she was not able to report the overage to the supervisor since the latter was on leave on that day and that she was still tracing the overage; and that the omission or failure to report immediately the overage (sic) was just a simple mistake without intent to defraud her employer.
WHEREFORE, in view of all the foregoing, judgment is hereby entered ordering the dismissal of the instant complaint for lack of merit.
This is not a case of simple negligence as the facts show that complainant, instead of reporting the matter immediately, had set aside the P540.00 for her personal use instead of reporting the overage or recording it in the operating system of the company.
In the instant case, PJ LHUILLIER was not able to discharge the burden of proving that the dismissal of the complainant was for valid or just causes of serious misconduct and willful breach of trust. Thus, We disagree with the Labor Arbiter's findings and conclusion that complainant was validly dismissed from service.
(c) to pay ten percent (10%) of the total money award as attorney's fees.
WHETHER OR NOT THE RESPONDENT [NLRC] COMMITTED GRAVE ABUSE OF DISCRETION AMOUNTING TO LACK OR IN EXCESS OF JURISDICTION WHEN IT DEVIATED FROM THE FINDINGS OF FACTS OF THE HONORABLE LABOR ARBITER.
We concur with the NLRC in finding for private respondent. Time and again, the Supreme Court has held that it is cruel and unjust to impose the drastic penalty of dismissal if not commensurate to the gravity of the misdeed.
In employee termination disputes, the employer bears the burden of proving that the employee's dismissal was for just and valid cause. In the instant case, the evidence does not support the finding of the Labor Arbiter that private respondent is guilty of serious misconduct.
In this jurisdiction, the Supreme Court has consistently defined misconduct as an improper or wrong conduct, a transgression of some established and definite rule of action, a forbidden act, a dereliction of duty, willful in character, implies wrongful intent and not mere error of judgment. To be a just cause for termination under Article 282 of the Labor Code of the Philippines, the misconduct must be serious, that is, it must be of such grave and aggravated character and not merely trivial or unimportant. However serious, such misconduct must nevertheless be in connection with the employee's work; the act complained of must be related to the performance of the employee's duties showing him to be unfit to continue working for the employer.
Private respondent's lapse was not a "serious" one, let alone indicative of serious misconduct. In fact, she (herein private respondent) admitted that she was not able to report the overage to the supervisor since the latter was on leave on that day and that she was still tracing the overage; and that the omission or failure to report immediately the overage was just a simple mistake without intent to defraud her employer. As found by the NLRC, private respondent worked for petitioner for almost six (6) years, and it is not shown that she committed any infraction of company rules during her employment. In fact, private respondent was once awarded by petitioner due to her heroic act of defending her Manager, Ms. Lilibeth Cortez, while resisting a hold-upper.
The settled rule is that when supported by substantial evidence, factual findings made by quasi-judicial and administrative bodies are accorded great respect and even finality by the courts. These findings are not infallible, though; when there is a showing that they were arrived at arbitrarily or in disregard of the evidence on record, they may be examined by the courts. Hence, when factual findings of the Labor Arbiter and the NLRC are contrary to each other, there is a necessity to review the records to determine which conclusions are more conformable to the evidentiary facts. The case before Us shows that the finding of the NLRC is supported by substantive evidence as compared to the finding of the Labor Arbiter with respect to the issue of illegal dismissal. Moreover, in case of doubt, such cases should be resolved in favor of labor, pursuant to the social justice policy of labor laws and the Constitution.
Invoking Article 27911 of the Labor Code, the CA agreed with the NLRC that the respondent should have been reinstated without loss of seniority rights and other privileges, with payment of her full backwages, inclusive of allowances and other benefits or their monetary equivalent computed from the time her compensation was withheld up to the time of actual reinstatement. However, with the parties' relations now strained, the CA conceded that the payment of a separation pay, along with backwages as a separate and distinct relief, is an acceptable alternative to reinstatement. The CA further awarded the respondent attorney's fees since she was forced to litigate and incur expenses to protect her rights and interests by reason of the unjustified acts of the petitioners.
WHETHER OR NOT THE MISAPPROPRIATION BY A PAWNSHOP PERSONNEL IN THE AMOUNT OF [P]540.00, COUPLED WITH SUBSEQUENT DENIALS, AMOUNT TO A SERIOUS MISCONDUCT IN OFFICE?
The appellate court agreed with the NLRC that the respondent's lapse was "just a simple mistake without intent to defraud her employer;"13 that the incident was neither serious nor indicative of serious misconduct; and that her dismissal was disproportionate to her offense. It accepted the respondent's explanation that her failure to report her cash overage of P540.00 on October 29, 2007 to the branch manager, who was her immediate superior, was because the latter was then on leave, and that for days thereafter, she was hard-pressed in trying to trace and determine the cause thereof. The CA noted that the respondent had worked for PJLI for almost six years without any previous infractions of company rules, and that she was once commended for a heroic act of defending her former branch manager, Ms. Lilibeth Cortez, during a branch holdup.
In addition to its pawnshop operations, the PJLI offers its "Pera Padala" cash remittance service whereby, for a fee or "sending charge," a customer may remit money to a consignee through its network of pawnshop branches all over the country. On October 29, 2007, a customer sent P500.00 through its branch in Capistrano, Cagayan de Oro City, and paid a remittance fee of P40.00. Inexplicably, however, no corresponding entry was made to recognize the cash receipt of P540.00 in the computerized accounting system (operating system) of the PJLI. The respondent claimed that she tried very hard but could not trace the source of her unexplained cash surplus of P540.00, but a branch audit conducted sometime in December 2007 showed that it came from a "Pera Padala" customer.
To be sure, no significant financial injury was sustained by the PJLI in the loss of a mere P540.00 in cash, which, according to the respondent she sincerely wanted to account for except that she was pre-empted by fear of what her branch manager might do once she learned of it. But in treating the respondent's misconduct as a simple negligence or a simple mistake, both the CA and the NLRC grossly failed to consider that she held a position of utmost trust and confidence in the company.
The respondent was first hired by the petitioners as an accounting clerk on June 13, 2003, for which she received a basic monthly salary of P9,353.00. On October 29, 2007, the date of the subject incident, she performed the function of vault custodian and cashier in the petitioners' Branch 4 pawnshop in Capistrano, Cagayan de Oro City. In addition to her custodial duties, it was the respondent who electronically posted the day's transactions in the books of accounts of the branch, a function that is essentially separate from that of cashier or custodian. It is plain to see then that when both functions are assigned to one person to perform, a very risky situation of conflicting interests is created whereby the cashier can purloin the money in her custody and effectively cover her tracks, at least temporarily, by simply not recording in the books the cash receipt she misappropriated. This is commonly referred to as lapping of accounts.17 Only a most trusted clerk would be allowed to perform the two functions, and the respondent enjoyed this trust.
The respondent insists that she never intended to appropriate the money but was afraid that Tuling would scold her, and that she kept the money for a long time in her drawer and only decided to take it home after her search for the cause of the cash overage had proved futile. Both the CA and the NLRC agreed with her, and held that what she committed was a simple mistake or simple negligence.
Granting arguendo that for some reason not due to her fault, the respondent could not trace the source of the cash surplus, she nonetheless well knew and understood the company's policy that unexplained cash must be treated as miscellaneous income under the account "Other Income," and that the same must be so recognized and recorded at the end of the day in the branch books or "operating system." No such entry was made by the respondent, resulting in unrecorded cash in her possession of P540.00, which the company learned about only two months thereafter through a branch audit.
Significantly, when Tuling returned on November 3, 2007 from her leave of absence, the respondent did not just withhold from her the fact that she had an unaccounted overage, but she refused to seek her help on what to do about it, despite having had five days to mull over the matter until Tuling's return.
The petitioners are fully justified in claiming loss of trust and confidence in the respondent. While it is natural and understandable that the respondent should feel apprehensive about Tuling's reaction concerning her cash overage, considering that it was their first time to be working together in the same branch, we must keep in mind that the unaccounted cash can only be imputed to the respondent's own negligence in failing to keep track of the transaction from which the money came. A subsequent branch audit revealed that it came from a "Pera Padala" remittance, implying that although the amount had been duly remitted to the consignee, the sending branch failed to record the payment received from the consigning customer. For days following the overage, the respondent tried but failed to reconcile her records, and for this inept handling of a "Pera Padala" remittance, she already deserved to be sanctioned.
The respondent's actuations were willful and deliberate. A cashier who, through carelessness, lost a document evidencing a cash receipt, and then wilfully chose not to record the excess cash as miscellaneous income and instead took it home and spent it on herself, and later repeatedly denied or concealed the cash overage when confronted, deserves to be dismissed.
WHEREFORE, premises considered, the petition is hereby GRANTED. The Decision dated June 30, 2011 of the Court of Appeals in CA-G.R. SP No. 03069 is REVERSED and SET ASIDE. The Decision of the Labor Arbiter dated July 23, 2008 is REINSTATED.
Velasco, Jr., (Chairperson), Villarama, Jr., Perlas-Bernabe,* and Jardeleza, JJ., concur.
* Acting member per Special Order No. 1866 dated November 4, 2014 vice Associate Justice Diosdado M. Peralta.
2 Penned by Associate Justice Edgar T. Lloren, with Associate Justices Romulo V. Borja and Carmelita Salandanan-Manahan, concurring; id. at 23-32.
11Art. 279. Security of Tenure. - x x x An employee who is unjustly dismissed from work shall be entitled to reinstatement without loss of seniority rights and other privileges and to his full backwages, inclusive of allowances, and to his other benefits or their monetary equivalent computed from the time his compensation was withheld from him up to the time of his actual reinstatement.
14 Petitioner's Memorandum; id. at 77.
15 Mercury Drug Corporation v. Serrano, 519 Phil. 409, 418 (2006); Caingat v. NLRC, 493 Phil. 299, 308 (2005).
16 M+W Zander Philippines, Inc., et al. v. Enriquez, 606 Phil. 591, 607 (2009).
"Lapping" is a concealment technique where the subtraction of money from one customer is covered by applying the payment of a different customer. For example, a cashier may steal a payment from customer A and cover it by applying a payment from customer B to customer A's account. Then when customer C pays, that amount is applied to customer B['s account] and so on. Smart crooks would never lap accounts receivable, but amateurs do not realize that the technique requires constant monitoring to avoid detection. Most lapping schemes don't last long because of the continuous manual intervention required.
18Jerusalem v. Kepp el Monte Bank, G.R. No. 169564, April 6, 2011, 647 SCRA313, 323-324.
19Central Pangasinan Electric Cooperative, Inc. v. Macaraeg, 443 Phil. 866, 874 (2003).
20Philippine Plaza Holdings, Inc. v. Episcope, G.R. No. 192826, February 27, 2013, 692 SCRA 227, 236.
21 Per PJLI Formal Investigation Report, rollo, pp. 90-92.
23Metro Drug Corporation v, NLRC, 227 Phil. 121, 124-125 (1986).
24 Quezon Electric Cooperative v. NLRC, 254 Phil. 84, 88 (1989). See Caneda v. Philippine Airlines Inc., 545 Phil. 560, 564 (2007).
27 Central Pangasinan Electric Cooperative, Inc. v. Macaraeg, supra note 19, at 874-875.
28 Reynolds Philippine Corporation v. Eslava, 221 Phil. 614, 620 (1985).
31 G.R. No. 191008, April 11, 2011, 647 SCRA 568.
32 Id. at 573-574, citing Cruz, Jr. v. CA, 527 Phil. 230, 242-243 (2006).
33See Metro Drug Corporation v. NLRC, supra note 23 and Caheda v. Philippine Airlines, Inc., supra note 24.
34 447 Phil. 264 (2003).
36 545 Phil. 560 (2007).
38 227 Phil. 121 (1986).

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