514 Phil. 363
CHICO-NAZARIO, J.:
WHEREFORE, the respondents are hereby ordered to pay US$3,127.50 or Php82,253.25 to Reynaldo D. Dela Cruz for the unexpired portion of 3 months and 15 days of his contract of employment; US$5,699.00 or PhP149,883.70 to Elur S. Nono, corresponding to his salaries for the unexpired portion of 8 months and 6 days of his employment contract; US$440.00 or PhP11,572.00 as the full cost of Dela Cruz's repatriation expenses; and US$256.00 or PhP6,732.80 corresponding to Nono's repatriation expenses.From the adverse decision of the Labor Arbiter, respondent companies appealed to the National Labor Relations Commission (NLRC).[6]
The respondents are further ordered to pay the complainants 10% of the monetary awards as attorney's fees.
Other claims are hereby dismissed for lack of sufficient evidence.
SO ORDERED.
WHEREFORE, the decision appealed from is hereby SET ASIDE. The complaint for illegal dismissal including respondents' counterclaim is (sic) dismissed for lack of merit.On 28 August 1998, reconsideration was sought by petitioner employees.
SO ORDERED.
Pursuant to the amendment to Section 4 of Rule 65 introduced by Supreme Court Circular No. 39-98 which took effect on 1 September 1998 – "If the petitioner had filed a motion for new trial or reconsideration in due time after notice of said judgment, order or resolution the period herein fixed shall be interrupted. If the motion is denied the aggrieved party may file the petition within the remaining period but which shall not be less than five (5) days in any event, reckoned from notice of such denial. No extension of time to file the petition shall be granted except for the most compelling reason and in no case to exceed fifteen (15) days," – the Court hereby RESOLVES to DISMISS the instant petition for having been filed beyond the reglementary period which expired on 28 November 1998.On 16 November 1999, the second assailed Resolution was promulgated denying petitioner employees' motion for reconsideration, ratiocinating that:
SO ORDERED.
Settled is the rule, to the point of being elementary, that perfection of an appeal within the statutory or reglementary period is not only mandatory but also jurisdictional (citation omitted); and dismissal of an appeal for lack of appellate jurisdiction based on a party's failure to perfect his appeal on time is not a technicality (citation omitted).Petitioner employees now come to this Court via a petition for review on certiorari under Rule 45 of the Rules of Civil Procedure, as amended.
SO ORDERED.
THE AMENDMENT TO RULE 65 HAD JUST TAKEN EFFECT WHEN THE PETITION FOR CERTIORARI WAS FILED;Simply put, the present petition raises as fundamental issues for resolution by the Court questions of procedure – whether or not (1) the Court of Appeals committed reversible error in dismissing petitioner employees' petition for certiorari for being filed beyond the reglementary period[11] provided for under Section 4, Rule 65 of the Rules of Civil Procedure, as amended by Supreme Court Circular No. 38-98; and (2) the appeal bond filed was adequate or sufficient to perfect an appeal before the NLRC.II.
RULES OF PROCEDURE SHOULD NOT BE ALLOWED TO DEFEAT SUBSTANTIAL JUSTICE; andIII.
THE DECISION OF THE HONORABLE LABOR ARBITER IS A FINAL AND EXECUTORY DECISION.
SEC. 4. Where and when petition to be filed. – The petition may be filed not later than sixty (60) days from notice of the judgment, order or resolution sought to be assailed in the Supreme Court.... If it involves the acts or omissions of a quasi-judicial agency, and unless otherwise provided by law or these Rules, the petition shall be filed in and cognizable only by the Court of Appeals.The records of the case at bar show that petitioner employees timely filed a motion for reconsideration on 28 August 1998 to the assailed NLRC decision received on 18 August 1998. A copy of the denial of said motion dated 14 September 1998 was likewise received on 09 October 1998. Applying the aforequoted amendment to the foregoing set of dates, clearly, ten (10) days have been consumed. Petitioner employees, thus, had a remaining period of fifty (50) days within which to file the petition for certiorari reckoned from 10 October 1998 or until 28 November 1998. The petition, however, was fi8. The petition, however, was fi ten (10) days beyond the reglementary period prescribed by the amended rule of civil procedure; hence its dismissal.
If the petitioner had filed a motion for new trial or reconsideration in due time after notice of said judgment, order or resolution, the period herein fixed shall be interrupted. If the motion is denied, the aggrieved party may file the petition within the remaining period, but which shall not be less than five (5) days in any event, reckoned from notice of such denial. No extension of time to file the petition shall be granted except for the most compelling reason and in no case to exceed fifteen (15) days. (Emphasis supplied.)
SEC. 4. When and where petition filed. – The petition shall be filed not later than sixty (60) days from notice of judgment, order or resolution. In case a motion for reconsideration or new trial is timely filed, whether such motion is required or not, the sixty (60) day period shall be counted from notice of the denial of the said motion.The present procedural issue vexing petitioner employees had already been squarely addressed by this Court in the case of Sps. Victor & Milagros Perez and Cristina Agraviador Aviso vs. Antonio Hermano.[17] For this reason, we deem it apt to quote in toto pertinent portions of the ponencia, viz:
The petition shall be filed in the same Supreme Court or, if it relates to the acts or omissions of a lower court or of a corporation, board, officer or person, in the Regional Trial Court exercising jurisdiction over the territorial area as defined by the Supreme Court. It may also be filed in the Court of Appeals whether or not the same is in aid of its appellate jurisdiction.
Under this amendment, the 60-day period within which to file the petition starts to run from receipt of notice of the denial of the motion for reconsideration, if one is filed (citation omitted).Bearing in mind the abovequoted jurisprudence, petitioner employees 0had a "fresh" 60-day period from the time they received a copy of the assailed Court of Appeals Resolution denying their motion for reconsideration, or from 09 October 1998. Petitioner employees, accordingly, had 60 days from 09 October 1998 within which to file the petition for certiorari. Said petition was filed on 08 December 1998, or on the 60th day; hence, without a doubt, the petition was seasonably filed within the reglementary period provided by the latest amendment aforequoted.
In Narzoles v. NLRC,[18] we described this latest amendment as curative in nature as it remedied the confusion brought about by Circular No. 39-98 because, "historically, i.e., even before the 1997 revision to the Rules of Civil Procedure, a party had a fresh period from receipt of the order denying the motion for reconsideration to file a petition for certiorari." Curative statutes, which are enacted to cure defects in a prior law or to validate legal proceedings which would otherwise be void for want of conformity with certain legal requirements, by their very essence, are retroactive (citation omitted). And, being a procedural rule, we held in Sps. Ma. Carmen and Victor Javellana v. Hon. Presiding Judge Benito Legarda (citation omitted) that "procedural laws are construed to be applicable to actions pending and undetermined at the time of their passage, and are deemed retroactive in that sense and to that extent."
WHEREFORE, the respondents are hereby ordered to pay US$3,127.50 or Php82,253.25 to Reynaldo D. Dela Cruz for the unexpired portion of 3 months and 15 days of his contract of employment; US$5,699.00 or PhP149,883.70 to Elur S. Nono, corresponding to his salaries for the unexpired portion of 8 months and 6 days of his employment contract; US$440.00 or PhP11,572.00 as the full cost of Dela Cruz's repatriation expenses; and US$256.00 or PhP6,732.80 corresponding to Nono's repatriation expenses.Petitioner employees posit that the decision of the Labor Arbiter in their favor had already attained finality upon failure of respondent companies to perfect their appeal to the NLRC. They aver that the appeal bond posted by respondent companies in the amount of P275,485.92[19] was only equivalent to US$6,850.42 at the conversion rate of P39.93[20] to US$1.00. The appealed decision however involves US$9,522.50 in totality. The inadequacy or deficiency of the appeal bond filed by respondent companies was, therefore, a fatal error; not being equivalent to the monetary award as indicated in the judgment appealed from, the period for filing an appeal to the NLRC lapsed without an appeal being perfected, rendering the decision of the Labor Arbiter final and executory.
The respondents are further ordered to pay the complainants 10% of the monetary awards as attorney's fees.
Other claims are hereby dismissed for lack of sufficient evidence.
SO ORDERED. [Emphasis supplied]
We have no quarrel with the provision of Article 223 of the Labor Code which, in part and among others, requires that in case of a judgment involving a monetary award, an appeal by the employer may be perfected only upon posting of a cash or surety bond x x x in the amount equivalent to the monetary award in the judgment appealed from. Perfection of an appeal within the period and in the manner prescribed by law is jurisdictional and non-compliance with such legal requirements is fatal and has the effect of rendering the judgment final and executory. (Emphasis supplied by petitioner employees.)to sustain their position that the Court of Appeals committed reversible error in dismissing their petition due to a technicality even if the decision subject of the petition was patently erroneous. Considering that they already had a vested right on the award given them by the final and executory judgment of the Labor Arbiter, as abovestated, the NLRC had no jurisdiction to entertain the appeal, let alone reverse the judgment subject of said appeal.
However, in a number of cases (citations omitted), the Court has eased the requirement of posting a bond, as a condition for perfection of appeals in labor cases, when to do so would bring about the immediate and appropriate resolution of controversies on the merits without over-indulgence in technicalities (citations omitted), ever mindful of the underlying spirit and intention of the Labor Code to ascertain the facts of each case speedily and objectively without regard to technical rules of law and procedure, all in the interest of due process (citations omitted.)....They maintain that "[i]f petitioners had read the subsequent paragraph from where it got the cited syllabus in the Cabalan case, petitioners would have realized that ... bolsters respondents' contention that the procedural requirement on posting an appeal bond should be literally construed...." All the foregoing things considered, respondent companies assert that, at the very least, they substantially complied with the rules on the filing of the supersedeas or appeal bond.
ART. 223. Appeal. - ...From the foregoing, it is clear that the law only requires that the amount of the appeal bond be equivalent to the monetary award in the judgment appealed from. In the case at bar, the Labor Arbiter's decision specified the Peso equivalent of the US dollar amounts awarded, such that the respondent companies could validly choose, as they so chose, to file a cash/surety bond in the specified Peso equivalent. Had the assailed decision not particularly indicated the Peso equivalent, but instead stated "or its Peso equivalent," petitioner employees' line of argument would necessarily require that the Peso equivalent be computed at the official conversion rate on the date of rendition of the decision. Anything less would inevitably result in an inadequate or deficient bond; thus, would result in non-perfection of an appeal before the NLRC. Lamentably, such is not the case here. Petitioner employees' stance failed to consider that foreign currency conversion rates, which by their very nature, are floating.
In case of a judgment involving a monetary award, an appeal by the employer may be perfected only upon the posting of a cash or surety bond issued by a reputable bonding company duly accredited by the Commission in the amount equivalent to the monetary award in the judgment appealed from. [Emphasis supplied.]
...
" For purposes of the bond required under Article 223 of the Labor Code as amended, the monetary award computed as of the date of promulgation of the decision appealed from shall be the basis of the bond. " [Emphasis supplied.]Furthermore, the accuracy of the Peso equivalent fixed by the Labor Arbiter, the propriety of the latter's actions in pegging the US dollar at a specific rate, and the awarding of backwages in an amount equivalent to more than three (3) months salary are not the material issues herein.