UNIVERSAL ROBINA SUGAR MILLING CORPORATION (URSUMCO)

and RENE CABATI v. FERDINAND ACIBO, et.al

[G.R. no. 186439]

FACTS:
URSUMCO hired the complainants to a contract of employment on
different capacities for a period of one (1) month and repeatedly hired the complainants
to a new contract to perform the same duties.
On August 23, 2002, the complainants filed before the Labor Arbiter
complaints for regularization, entitlement to the benefits under the existing CBA. The
Labor Arbiter dismissed the complaint on the ground that the complainants were
seasonal or project employees and not regular employees because they perform were
not directly related to URSUMCOs main operation and that their respective term were
coterminous with phase of the work.

On appeal, the NLRC declared that the complainants were regular employees if
URSUMCO pursuant to Article 280 of the Labor Code and granted the complainants
monetary claims.

The petitioners elevated the case to the Court of Appeals ( CA) after their motion
for reconsideration was denied by the NLRC.The CA affirmed the NLRCs ruling finding
the complainants to be regular employees of URSUMCO on the folloing grounds:
(a)complainants had been performing their respective taks for at least one 1 year (b) the
continuing need for the complainants performance and (c) necessity or indispensability
of the complainants task to URSUMCOs business.

Hence, the petitioners filed the present case to the SUPREME COURT after CA
denied their motion for partial reconsideration.

ISSUES:
1. Whether or not the respondents are regular employees of
URSUMCO in relation to ART. 280 of the Labor Code.

HELD:

Yes the respondents are regular employees of URSUMCO.

The SC ruled that the law regards the employee as regular when the task assigned was
done in the usual business or trade by the employer and the performance of the said
activities is considered as necessary and desirable.

Further, SC ruled that where circumstances evidently show that the employer imposed
the period precisely to preclude the employee from acquiring security, the law and then
court will not hesitate to strike down or disregard the period as contrary to public morals,
public policy, etc. In such a case, the general restrictive rule under Art. 280 of the Labor
Code will apply and the employee shall be deemed regular.

Furthermore, the SC added that the respondents shall be deemed as regular employee
of the petitioners on the following instances: (a) the task given to the respondents does
not pertain to a specific phase of URSUMCO but rather they were tasked to perform
duties regularly and habitually needed in URSUMCOs operation during milling season;
(b) the respondents were regularly and repeatedly hired; and (c) URSUMCO failed to
show that the respondents where free to work during the off-season.