Okaz/Saudi Gazette

RIYADH — The labor circuit at the Court of Appeal in Riyadh ruled to give a woman employee SR275000 in compensation for her arbitrary dismissal from service before completion of her contract period.

The woman was apparently sacked from a private company for her absence from job due to her salary being delayed for two months. The court considered that the employee’s contract was for a fixed period of which 18 months and 15 days were still remaining, and hence she is required to be compensated for the damage. It was stated in the ruling that the compensation amount includes the wages for the notice period, leave balance, and end-of-service allowance, in addition to granting her a certificate of experience as per the provisions of the Labor Law. The court noted that the ruling become final and enforceable.

Okaz/Saudi Gazette has learnt that the female employee filed a lawsuit before the labor court, in which she stated that she was arbitrarily dismissed from her job in a private company, and was subjected to harassment by the company, including insults and imposing penalties and fines without justification. This prompted her to resort to the labor office and stop working until the complaint was resolved. In her lawsuit, she requested that the establishment must be penalized for its abuse of power.

The representative of the company responded with a memorandum in which he noted that the plaintiff stopped working, and hence the company applied the Labor Law regulations against her. In its ruling the court stated that the plaintiff employee stated that her absence from work was due to her not being paid her salary for two months, which prompted her to stop working, while the defendant company confirmed that the plaintiff did not receive her wages for this period due to the company’s financial circumstances.

The court said that the absence of the employee due to non-payment of wages is her right based on Article 81 of the Labor Law, and accordingly her dismissal due to absence is unlawful, and that the plaintiff deserves compensation for dismissal based on Article 77 of the Labor Law, which concludes that her dismissal was proven arbitrary and that she is entitled to the compensation awarded by the court.

Meanwhile, legal expert Khaled Abu Rashid told Okaz/Saudi Gazette that the Labor Law grants the worker the right to leave work without notice under seven circumstances while maintaining all his/her legal rights. Any worker may leave work if the employer does not fulfill his essential contractual or legal obligations, or if it is proven that the employer or his representative has defrauded him at the time of contracting with regard to the terms and conditions of work. The third circumstance is if the employer assigns the worker, without his consent, to work that is fundamentally different from the work agreed upon. The fourth case is if the employer, a member of his family, or the responsible manager commits a violent assault or immoral behavior towards the worker or a member of his family.

Abu Rashid said the fifth case is if the treatment of the employer or the responsible manager is characterized by cruelty, injustice or insult, and the sixth case is if there is a serious danger in the workplace that threatens the safety or health of the worker, provided that the employer was aware of its existence and did not take measures to remove it, and the last case is if the employer or his representative has pushed the worker by his actions, especially by his unfair treatment or by violating the terms of the contract, to the point that the worker is apparently the one who terminated the contract.

Abu Rashid explained that the Labor Law obliges the employer upon the end of the employment contract to give the worker - upon his request - a service certificate without charge, stating the date of his joining the work, the date of the end of his relationship with the employer, his profession, and the amount of his last wage must be included in the certificate. The employer may not include in the certificate anything that may harm the worker's reputation or reduce his job opportunities, in addition to returning to the worker all certificates or documents that he had deposited with him.