Tegimenta Chemical Phils./Garcia vs. Buensalida

No forum shopping is committed by filing a second NLRC complaint during the pendency of a first where the two cases involve different causes of action founded on distinct sets of facts, the labor cause of action being finally ascertained from both the complaint and the position paper. Because the Davao case concerned illegal deductions and refusal to process benefit forms while the NCR case concerned subsequent reassignment alleged as constructive dismissal and underpayment of benefits, the requisites of litis pendentia were absent and independent prosecution was sanctioned.

Tegimenta Chemical Philippines, a sole proprietorship owned by Vivian D. Garcia, is engaged in the business of providing manpower for the servicing and maintenance of air conditioning and air handling units supplied to its clients. Rolan E. Buensalida was hired by petitioner on September 8, 1997 as an aircon maintenance technician and was subsequently assigned to service operations in Davao City.

On February 26, 2003, respondent injured his left ring finger while repairing air handling units at the SM Department Store in Davao City. He underwent a surgical debridement procedure and was confined in the hospital for two days. SM Prime Holdings initially shouldered the hospitalization expenses amounting to P30,331.61 but subsequently collected the amount from petitioner, who in turn informed respondent that the amount would be deducted from his salary. Thus, beginning April 20, 2003, petitioner deducted P300.00 from respondent's weekly earnings, or P1,200.00 monthly.

According to respondent, he sought SSS benefits by accomplishing an Employee Notification Form (SSS Form B-300 [8/75]) which he mailed to petitioner for completion, but petitioner did not return it on the ground that filing was beyond the allowable period. Petitioner likewise ignored respondent's PhilHealth Form 1 sent together with the SSS form. Thereafter, respondent demanded restoration of the deducted amounts but was refused. Hence, on May 16, 2003, he filed a complaint for constructive dismissal with money claims before Regional Arbitration Branch No. XI in Davao City.

Meanwhile, petitioner recalled respondent to the Head Office in Quezon City per Memorandum dated September 25, 2003, without advancing travel fare. Respondent averred that the transfer was intended to harass him in view of the estrangement caused by the Davao case, and he was instructed to attend SSS and PhilHealth seminars on October 21, 2003. On October 3, 2003, petitioner informed respondent that he would be reassigned to Manila as night shift supervisor effective October 6, 2003. Respondent refused the assignment because it would affect his gross income and other benefits, the night shift having no fixed work schedule in contrast to his previous six-days-a-week schedule, thereby depriving him of fixed or regular income. On October 16, 2003, petitioner reiterated the reassignment as for the good interest of the company, aimed to stop increasing polarization among personnel in Davao City and as a result of cost-cutting measures in all SM branches.

On October 27, 2003, respondent filed another complaint for constructive illegal dismissal before the NLRC-NCR-North Sector in Quezon City, subsequently amended to include underpayment or non-payment of salaries, service incentive leave, 13th month pay and boarding house rental. He claimed petitioner failed to pay boarding expenses promised for the Davao assignment and did not pay ECOLA, 13th month pay and service incentive leave pay as required by law. Petitioner moved to dismiss for forum shopping while respondent submitted his position paper; no adjudication on the merits of the injury, deductions, reassignment, or monetary claims ensued because the Labor Arbiter dismissed the NCR case on the ground that its cause was embraced in the Davao case, which dismissal the NLRC affirmed.

• Forum Shopping and Dismissal Under NLRC Rules: Petitioner alleged that the Davao case was a pending case similar to the NCR case and that the latter should be dismissed pursuant to Section 14(a) of the NLRC Rules of Procedure as well as Supreme Court Administrative Circular No. 04-94.
• Prejudice From Simultaneous Prosecution: Petitioner maintained that allowing simultaneous prosecution of the two cases would expose the parties to unnecessary expenses by attending proceedings in Quezon City and in Davao City and presented great danger of dispensing two contradictory decisions prejudicial to the parties.

• Distinct Causes of Action: Respondent contended that the two cases had different causes of action, with the Davao case for illegal deduction and the NCR case for constructive illegal dismissal, as shown by the distinct issues raised in his position papers filed in the two cases.

• Forum Shopping: Whether respondent was guilty of forum shopping in filing the NCR case for constructive illegal dismissal despite the pendency of the Davao case.
• Ascertainment of Cause of Action in NLRC Cases: Whether the cause of action is determined from the face of the NLRC complaint alone or from the complaint together with the position paper.
• Consolidation and Joinder of Causes: Whether the NCR case was barred by the rule requiring inclusion of all causes of action in one complaint or should have been consolidated with the Davao case.

• Forum Shopping: No. Respondent was not guilty of forum shopping because the Davao and NCR cases involved different causes of action and relief founded on distinct facts, so litis pendentia and res judicata were absent.
• Ascertainment of Cause of Action in NLRC Cases: The complaint alone is insufficient. The cause of action is finally ascertained only after evaluating both the NLRC complaint checklist and the position paper, which forecloses unpleaded matters.
• Consolidation and Joinder of Causes: No. Joinder was impossible because the constructive dismissal claim arose after the Davao filing, and consolidation was impermissible because the cases pended before different Regional Arbitration Branches.

• Forum Shopping: Forum shopping requires identity of parties, identity of rights asserted and relief prayed for founded on the same facts, and such identity that judgment in one would be res judicata in the other. While identity of parties concededly existed, the second and third requisites did not. The Davao position paper raised (1) whether the injury was work-related, (2) whether salary deductions were proper, and (3) whether refusal to complete SSS and PhilHealth forms was justified, without discussing constructive dismissal, premium, holiday or leave pay checked in the form. The NCR case raised whether complainant was illegally dismissed, entitled to monetary claims, full backwages and separation pay, and moral and exemplary damages. The facts constitutive of constructive dismissal arose only after the Davao complaint, when respondent was recalled and reassigned, and respondent in the Davao case stated only that he did not know whether he would be terminated soon. Different evidence would be required, such that the outcome of one would not decide the other.
• Ascertainment of Cause of Action in NLRC Cases: An NLRC complaint consists only of a printed blank form providing a checklist of possible causes of action to facilitate filing even without counsel, setting forth grievances only in a general manner. Under Section 4, Rule V of the NLRC Rules, verified position papers shall cover only claims and causes raised in the complaint, and parties thereafter may not allege facts or causes not included in the complaint or position papers, affidavits and documents. Filing of the position paper is thus the operative act foreclosing other matters. A cause of action, defined as the delict or wrongful act or omission in violation of plaintiff's primary right, cannot be finally determined from the generic checklist term alone. At face value the two complaints appeared similar, both checking constructive illegal dismissal, but the position papers revealed distinct delicts and prayers.
• Consolidation and Joinder of Causes: Section 1(b), Rule 3 requiring a party with more than one cause arising from the same relationship to include all in one complaint had no application because respondent could not yet have claimed constructive dismissal when the Davao case was filed. Consolidation under Section 3, Rule IV applies only where two or more cases pend before different Labor Arbiters in the same Regional Arbitration Branch involving the same employer and common or different causes. Consolidation was plainly unavailable because the Davao case pended in Davao City and the NCR case in the National Capital Region. Separate ventilation in Manila was understandable since respondent had been recalled there, lacked employment and owned only rented boarding space in Davao, and the material acts alleged as constructive dismissal transpired in Manila.

• Forum shopping — Forum shopping consists of filing multiple suits involving the same parties for the same cause of action, either simultaneously or successively, to obtain a favorable judgment, and exists where the elements of litis pendentia concur: (a) identity of parties or interests, (b) identity of rights asserted and relief prayed for founded on the same facts, and (c) such identity that judgment in the pending case would be res judicata in the other. Applied here, the doctrine did not bar the second suit because, despite identity of parties, the rights, relief, and factual foundations differed and neither judgment would bar the other.
• Cause of action — A cause of action is the delict or wrongful act or omission committed by the defendant in violation of the primary right of the plaintiff. Applied here, the generic checkmarks for constructive illegal dismissal on the NLRC complaint forms did not conclusively establish identity of delicts; examination of the pleaded wrongful acts showed illegal deductions and benefit-form refusal in one case and harassing recall, reassignment, and underpayment in the other.
• Determination of labor cause of action from complaint and position paper — An NLRC complaint is merely a blank checklist designed to allow employees to plead grievances generally without counsel and is not solely determinative of the ultimate cause of action; under the NLRC Rules, verified position papers cover only claims and causes raised in the complaint and thereafter foreclose allegation of new facts or causes, so the cause is finally ascertained only after evaluating both pleadings. Applied here, facial similarity of the complaints was overcome by the position papers, which limited the Davao case to deductions and the NCR case to constructive dismissal and money claims.
• Consolidation of NLRC cases — Where two or more cases pend before different Labor Arbiters in the same Regional Arbitration Branch involving the same employer and common principal causes or the same parties with different causes, subsequent cases shall be consolidated with the first to avoid costs or delay. Applied here, consolidation was denied because the cases pended in different branches, Davao City and the National Capital Region, and the rule by its terms required pendency in the same branch.

• "A cause of action is the delict or wrongful act or omission committed by the defendant in violation of the primary right of the plaintiff." — States the canonical definition used to distinguish the wrongful acts alleged in the Davao deduction dispute from those alleged in the NCR dismissal dispute.
• "Forum shopping consists of filing multiple suits involving the same parties for the same cause of action, either simultaneously or successively, for the purpose of obtaining a favorable judgment." — Articulates the controlling definition whose elements of litis pendentia were found absent for lack of identity of rights, facts, and res judicata effect.
• "These verified position papers to be submitted shall cover only those claims and causes of action raised in the complaint excluding those that may have been amicably settled, and shall be accompanied by all supporting documents including the affidavits of their respective witnesses which shall take the place of the latter's direct testimony." — Sets forth the procedural basis for treating the position paper as the operative pleading that fixes and limits the labor cause of action.
• "The check list was designed to facilitate the filing of complaints by employees and laborers even without the intervention of counsel." — Explains why reliance on the face of the NLRC complaint form alone is insufficient to determine identity of causes of action for forum shopping.

• Guaranteed Hotels, Inc. vs. Baltao, G.R. No. 164338, January 17, 2005, 448 SCRA 738, 743 — Cited as authority for the definition of forum shopping as filing multiple suits involving the same parties for the same cause of action to obtain a favorable judgment.
• Mondragon Leisure and Resorts Corporation vs. Court of Appeals, G.R. No. 154188, June 15, 2005, 460 SCRA 279, 285-286 — Cited as authority for the three elements of litis pendentia whose second and third elements were held absent in this case.

• Rule 2, Section 2, Rules of Court — Defines cause of action as the act or omission violating plaintiff's right; used to hold that generic NLRC checklist terms do not finally establish the delict sued upon.
• Section 4, Rule V, NLRC New Rules of Procedure, as amended by NLRC Resolution No. 01-02 (Series of 2002) — Requires simultaneous verified position papers covering only claims and causes raised in the complaint and bars later allegation of new facts or causes; used to hold that the cause is fixed only after complaint and position paper are evaluated.
• Section 1(b), Rule 3, NLRC Rules of Procedure — Requires a party with more than one cause arising from the same relationship to include all in one complaint; held inapplicable because the constructive dismissal cause arose only after the Davao case was filed.
• Section 3, Rule IV, NLRC Rules of Procedure — Mandates consolidation only where cases pend before different Labor Arbiters in the same Regional Arbitration Branch; used to deny consolidation of Davao and NCR cases pending in different branches.
• Section 14(a), NLRC Rules of Procedure and Supreme Court Administrative Circular No. 04-94 — Invoked by petitioner as basis for dismissal for forum shopping; held inapplicable for lack of identity of causes of action.

Austria-Martinez, J., Chico-Nazario, J., Reyes, J., and Brion, J.