7. Other Illicit Forms of Employment Arrangements

Illicit Forms of Employment Arrangements

The following are declared prohibited for being contrary to law or public policy:

• When the principal farms out work to a "Cabo".

“Cabo” refers to a person or group of persons or to a labor group which, under the guise of labor organization, cooperative, or any entity, supplies workers to an employer, with or without any monetary or other consideration, whether in the capacity of agent of the employer or as ostensible independent contractor. (D.O. No. 174-17, Sec. 3[b])

• Contracting out of job or work through an in-house agency.
• Contracting out of job or work through an in-house cooperative which merely supplies workers to the principal.
• Contracting out of a job or work by reason of a strike or lockout whether actual or imminent.
• Contracting out of a job or work being performed by union members and such will interfere with, restrain or coerce employees in the exercise of their rights to self-organization as provided in Article 259 of the Labor Code, as amended
• Requiring the contractor's/subcontractor's employees to perform functions which are currently being performed by the regular employees of the principal.
• Requiring the contractor's/subcontractor's employees to sign, as a precondition to employment or continued employment, an antedated resignation letter; a blank payroll; a waiver of labor standards including minimum wages and social or welfare benefits; or a quitclaim releasing the principal or contractor from liability as to payment of future claims; or require the employee to become member of a cooperative.
• Repeated hiring by the contractor/subcontractor of employees under an employment contract of short duration.
• Requiring employees under a contracting/subcontracting arrangement to sign a contract fixing the period of employment to a term shorter than the term of the Service Agreement, unless the contract is divisible into phases for which substantially different skills are required and this is made known to the employee at the time of engagement.
• Such other practices, schemes or employment arrangements designed to circumvent the right of workers to security of tenure. (D.O. No. 174-17, Sec. 6)

FOURTH ULP: FEATHERBEDDING AND MAKE – WORK ARRANGEMENTS (ART. 260 [D])

Featherbedding: For purposes of the union unfair labor practice under Art. 260(d), a labor organization causes or attempts to cause an employer to pay or agree to pay for services not performed or not to be performed. Maintaining a crew or increasing work time does not, by itself, establish this unfair labor practice.

In spite of employee assertions that these so-called featherbedding [or make-work] practices are directly related to job security, or health and safety, most courts at common law found these practices to be economically wasteful and without any legitimate employee justification. (Cox, Cases and Materials on labor Law, NY, 1977, p.919, cited in Azucena Vols. II-A and II-B, 9th ed., 2016, p. 372).

Note: It may take the form of minimum crew regulations on the railroad, make – work rules such as the setting of and prompt destruction of unneeded bogus type in the newspaper industry, stand – by pay for musicians when a radio station broadcasts music from phonograph records or production ceilings for work on the assembly lines or at the construction site.