RED V COCONUT PRODUCTS, LTD., PETITIONER, VS. COURT OF INDUSTRIAL RELATIONS, TANGLAW NG PAGGAWA, ALBERTO DELA-CRUZ, ET AL., RESPONDENTS.

Red V Coconut Products,
Ltd, is a corporation with principal office and place of business at
Lucena City. It has in that city a desiccated coconut factory. In said
factory, it has several hundred workres, about 800 of said workers are
members of Tanglaw ng Paggawa labor union.

Tanglaw ng Paggawa and Red V Coconut Products, Ltd.
entered into a collective bargaining agreement on July 15, 1958,
Subsequently, however, on October 15, 1961, the aforementioned company
and union entered Into another collective bargaining agreement, to
expire on October 31, 1965.

The 1958 collective bargaining agreement provided among other things for payment of differentials to night shift workers in the desiccated coconut factory.

The 1961 collective bargaining agreement retained the same arrangement. It stated:

“The present shift differential will remain in effect, namely, 35¢ for the second shift and 55c for the third shift.”

In the factory, there are two groups of workers, the three-shift group
– let us call it Group A – and the two-shift group – which we shall
call Group B. As observed by the parties thereto, differentials were
paid to the workers, under the 1958 and 1961 contracts, thus:

	Hours of Work		Differentials
Group	A-1st shift	4 A. M-12 Noon	(8 Hrs.) None
	2nd shift	12 Noon- 8 P.M.	(8 Hrs.) .35
	3rd shift	8 P. M.-4 A. M.	(8 Hrs.) .55
Group	B-1st shift	4 A. M.-4 P.M.	(12 Hrs.) None
	2nd shift	4 P.M.- 4 A. M.	(12 Hrs.) .55

On January 17, 1962, Tanglaw ng Paggawa and some 300 workers in the
above-stated factory, members of the said union, who belong to Group B,
filed a petition in the Court of Industrial Relations. Petitioners
therein alleged that the petitioners-workers are shellers, parers,
counters and haulers in the two shifts (Group B) consisting of 12 hours
each shift, the first shift from 4:00 A.M. to 4:00 P.M. and the second
shift from 4 P.M. to 4 A.M.; that said workers change shift assignments
every week; that, accordingly, all of them work from 4 A.M. to 4 P.M. (first shift) for two alternate weeks per month
and from 4 P.M. to 4 A.M. (second shift) likewise for two alternate
weeks in a month; that although said workers perform work from 4 P.M.
to 4 A.M., they receive only P.55 differential pay for the
corresponding hours of night work; that their nightwork is equivalent
to the nightwork of the 2nd and 3rd shifts of Group A combined, so that
they should receive what the 2nd and 3rd shifts of Group A, combined,
receive as differential pay, namely, P.90 (P.55 plus P.35); that,
therefore, they are entitled to payment of P.35 more as differential
pay, since up to the time of the petition, they received only P.55 per
night as differential pay.

Said additional P.35 was asked by the petitioners-workers of Group B
for work done by them from 4 P.M. to 4 A.M. Their claim referred to the
time from July 15, 1958 to the date of the petition, allegedly at
P186.90 per sheller, parer, counter and hauler, or a total sum of
P65,228.10 more or less.

Respondent company therein filed on January 28, 1962 a motion to
dismiss, stating that the Court of Industrial Relations has no
jurisdiction over the case for the reason that the claim asserted in
the petition is a simple money claim and that an interpretation of a
contract (the collective bargaining agreements) is involved, which
pertains to the regular courts.

The Court of Industrial Relations denied said motion by resolution of February 17, 1962 ruling that the claim is for unpaid overtime pay of laborers still employed by
the company. Said court likewise denied a motion for reconsideration of
the resolution. Red V Coconut Products, Ltd. filed its answer on May 2,
1962.

In the meanwhile, on April 25, 1962, Tanglaw ng Paggawa filed with the Court of Industrial Relations a new and independent petition alleging unfair labor practice against Red V Coconut Products, Ltd.
(CIR Case No. 3153-ULP). It was asserted therein that the company
refused to grant 15-days leave with pay to the members of the union in
violation of the 1961 collective bargaining agreement.

The Court of Industrial Relations, on January 19, 1963, after
trial, rendered its decision on the petition for differential pay (CIR
Case No. 1642-V). It found therein that the petitioners-workers are
engaged on pakiao or piece-work basis, and, therefore, are not
entitled to overtime pay under the Eight-Hour Labor Law (Sec. 2, CA
444); that their petition for night shift differentials based on the
collective bargaining agreements is meritorious because the company having paid night differentials Indiscriminately to the night shift
workers of Group A and Group B alike, the payments should be uniform
and equal for the night shifts of both groups, that is, P.90. It
therefore ordered payment of the deficiency in said differentials to
the workers of Group B.

Red V Coconut Products, Ltd., moved for reconsideration of said
decision on January 29, 1963. The Court of Industrial Relations en banc
denied said motion by resolution of February 25, 1963. And, hence. Red
V Coconut Products, Ltd., filed this petition for review herein.

Petitioner herein contends that the present case involves a mere
money claim over which the Court of Industrial Relations has no
jurisdiction.^[1]

It is axiomatic that to determine the issue of Jurisdiction resort
is to be made to the allegations in the petition or complaint.^[2]
The petition for shift differential in the present case, it is true,
did not expressly mention the Eight-Hour Labor Law. Nonetheless, it
clearly asserted that (1) petitioners-laborers “are working in the Red V Coconut Products, Ltd.” and (2) they “work in two (2) shifts (Blue and Red shifts) consisting of approximately 12 hours each shift.”
Accordingly, from the said allegations, it is proper to regard the
petition, as the Court of Industrial Relations did, as one for overtime
pay by workers still employed by the company. As such It falls within
the Jurisdiction of the Court of Industrial Relations. For the same is
in effect an assertion not of a simple money claim but, as respondent
court rightly held, of a claim for overtime pay by workers who are
employees of the company.^[3]

During the trial, as stated, evidence was adduced to the effect that
the aforesaid petitioners-workers were engaged on a piece-work basis.
The same, however, does not appear from the petition or complaint filed
with the respondent court. It therefore cannot affect its Jurisdiction
over the case, which was already acquired. For Jurisdiction, once
acquired, continues until final adjudication of the litigation.^[4]

Furthermore, although the Eight-Hour Labor Law provides that it
does not cover those workers who prefer to be paid on piece-work basis
(Sec. 2, CA 444), nothing in said law precludes an agreement for the
payment of overtime compensation to piece-workers. And in agreeing to
the provision for payment of shift differentials to the
petitioners-workers aforementioned. In the bargaining agreement, as
well as in actually paying to them said differentials, though not in full, the company in effect freely adhered
to an application and implementation of the Eight-Hour Labor Law, or
its objectives, to said workers. It should be observed that while the
provision in the bargaining agreements speaks of shift differentials
for the “second shift” and the “third shift” and Group B has no third
shift, said Group B has a second shift, which performs work equivalent
to that of the corresponding shifts of Group A. It follows that
respondent court did not err in ordering the company to pay the full
and equivalent amount of said differentials (P.90) corresponding, under
the bargaining agreements, to the workers who performed 12 hours of
work, from 4 P.M. to 4 A.M.

And, finally, the laborers in question are not strictly under the
full concept of piece-workers as contemplated by law for the reason
that their hours of work – that is, 12 hours per shift – are fixed by
the employer. As ruled by this Court in Lara vs. Del Rosario,
94 Phil. 780, 781-782, the philosophy underlying the exclusion of piece
workers from the Eight-Hour Labor Law is that said workers are paid
depending upon the work they do “irrespective of the amount of time employed” in doing said work.
Such freedom as to hours of work does not obtain in the case of the
laborers herein involved, since they are assigned by the employer to
work in two shifts for 12 hours each shift. Thus it cannot be said that
for all purposes these workers fall outside the law requiring
payment of compensation for work done in excess of eight hours. At
least for the purpose of recovering the full differential pay
stipulated in the bargaining agreement as due to laborers who perform 12 hours of work under the night shift, said laborers should be deemed pro tanto or to that extent within the scope of the aforestated law.

WHEREFORE, the decision and resolution of the Court of Industrial Relations under review are affirmed. So ordered.

Concepcion, C.J., Reyes, Barrera, Dizon, Regala, Makalintal, Zaldivar and Sanchez, JJ., concur.

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^[1] Relying upon rulings such as PRISCO vs. PRISCO Workers Union, L-9288, Dec. 29, 1958; SMB vs. Betla, L-16403, Oct. 30, 1961; Tiberio vs. Manila Pilots Ass’n., L-17661, Dec. 28, 1961.

^[2] Administrator etc. vs. Alberto et al., L-12133, Oct. 31, 1958; Campos Rueda Corp. vs. Bautista, L-18453, Sept. 29, 1962; American Oxygen & Acetylene Co. vs. CIR, L-, 18554, Dec. 27, 1962.

^[3] PRISCO vs. CIR, L-13806, May 23, 1960; MRR vs. CIR, L-17871, L-18160, L-18200 and L-18249, January 31, 1964.

^[4] Pamintuan vs. Tiglao, 53 Phil. 1; PLASLU vs. CIR, 93 Phil. 747; Rizal Surety & Ins. Co. vs. MRR, L-20875, April 30, 1966.