TITLE II.

WAGES
CHAPTER 1. PRELIMINARY MATTERS
Art. 97. DEFINITION
As used in this Title:
a) Persons an individual, partnership,
association, corporation, business
trust, legal representative, or any
organized group of persons.
b) Employer any person acting directly
or indirectly in the interest of an
employer in relation to an employee
and shall include the Government and
all its branches, subdivision and
instrumentalities, all governmentowned or controlled corporations
and institutions, as well as non-profit
private institutions, or organizations.
c) Employee any individual employed
by an employer.
d) Agriculture farming in all its
branches and among, other things,
includes the cultivation and tillage of
soil,
dairying,
the
production,
cultivation, growing and harvesting
of any agricultural and horticultural
commodities, the raising of livestock
or
poultry,
and
any
practices
performed by a farmer on a farm as
an incident to or in conjunction with
such farming operations, but DOES
NOT INCLUDE the manufacturing or
processing of sugar, coconuts, abaca,
tobacco, pineapples or other farm
products.
e) Employ to suffer or permit to work.
f) Wage paid to any employee shall
mean the remuneration or earnings,
however designated, capable of being
expressed
in
terms
of
money,
whether fixed or entertained on a
time, task, piece, or commission
basis, or other method of calculating
the same, which is payable by an
employer to an employee under a
written or unwritten contract of
employment for work done or to be
done, or for services rendered or to
be rendered and includes the fair and
reasonable value, as determined by
the Sec of Labor, of board, lodging, or
other facilities customarily furnished
by the employer to the employee.
Fair and reasonable value shall not
include any profit to the employer or
to any person affiliated with the
employer.
WAGE AND SALARY DEFINED
Wage

1. Compensation for manual labor, skill or

unskilled, paid at times, and measured
by day, week, month, or season
2. Inconsiderable pay for lower and less
responsible character of employment
Salary
1. Denotes
a
higher
degree
of
employment, or a superior grade of
services, and implies a position or
office
2. Suggestive of a larger and more
permanent or fixed compensation for
more important service
The SC, however, concluded that both
terms are synonymous

Wage includes Sales Commissions

Even if the commissions were in the form
of incentives or encouragement, so that
the salesman would be inspired to put a
little more industry on the jobs particularly
assigned to them, still the commissions
are directed remunerations for services
rendered w/c contributed to the increase
of the income of the employer. (Songco
et al v NLRC)
Commission
is
the
recompense
compensation or reward of an agent,
salesman, and of other similar employee
or worker, when the same is calculated as
a percentage on the amount of his
transactions or on the profit to the
principal. (supra)
Wage includes Facilities or Commodities
Wage includes the fair and reasonable
value of board, lodging, or other facilities
customarily furnished by the employer to
the employee
It means that an employer may provide,
basic necessities (e.g., food and lodging)
to his employees but he may deduct their
values
FACILITIES
DISTINGUISHED
FROM
SUPPLEMENTS
Facilities
1. Articles or services for the benefit of
the employee or his family but shall
not include tools of the trade or
articles or service primarily for the
benefit of the employer or necessary
to the conduct of the employees
business
2. Deductible
3. Benefit or privilege is part of the
labors basic wages
Supplements
1. Constitute extra remuneration or
special privilege or benefits given to or
NOTES ON LABOR STANDARDS By Terence Valdehueza

received by laborers over and above

their ordinary earnings or wages
2. Not deductible
Rule: The criterion is not much with
the kind of the benefit or item given,
but its purpose.

Requirement
Facilities

for

Deducting

Value

of

1. Proof must be shown that such facilities

are customarily furnished by the trade;
2. Provision of deductible facilities must be
voluntarily accepted in writing by the
employee; and
3. Facilities must be charged at fair and
reasonable value
NOTE: A benefit or privilege granted to an
employee for the convenience of the
employer is not a facility.

NOTES ON LABOR STANDARDS By Terence Valdehueza