LABOUR WARS: Can an employee claim two wage compensations from a single employment relationship?

Every employee is entitled to wages for their work. In cases where the termination of employment is deemed invalid, the employee is entitled to compensation for lost wages. However, in our opinion, one employment relationship should warrant only one compensation. One former employee of our client disagreed and claimed two wage compensations - one for the invalid immediate termination of their employment and another for the invalid termination by notice - for the same period.

In this case, the client first terminated the employment relationship through immediate termination. However, before the court’s decision on the validity of the immediate termination became final, the client terminated the employment again, this time by notice.

The employee sought compensation for wages due to the invalidity of the notice while simultaneously claiming compensation for wages due to the invalidity of the immediate termination for the period from the delivery of the notice until the client allowed them to return to work. Effectively, the employee attempted to duplicate their claims, seeking two separate wage compensations for the same period. The employee justified this by arguing that wage compensation serves as a sanction, and therefore, if an employer invalidly terminates employment multiple times, the employee is entitled to compensation for each invalid termination, even if the time periods overlap.

We disagreed with the employee’s interpretation, asserting that duplicating claims for wage compensation is inadmissible. The District Court sided with our argument and dismissed the employee’s lawsuit. The court clarified that wage claims based on an invalid termination are valid only until the court’s decision on the invalidity of the termination becomes final. If the employer fails to allow the employee to return to work after the final court decision, the employee’s wage claims are based on obstacles on the employer’s side rather than on the invalidity of the termination itself. These employer-side obstacles arise at the moment the court decision on the invalidity of termination becomes final.

The court also concluded that the client was not obligated to assign work to the employee after the court’s decision regarding the invalidity of the immediate termination became final, as the employment relationship had already been terminated by notice in the meantime. Therefore, the employee was entitled to wage compensation due to the invalidity of the immediate termination only until the point when the employment relationship would have been terminated by notice, and from that point onward, due to the invalidity of the notice. The court clearly distinguished the timeframes and legal grounds for which the employee could claim wage compensation.

This decision is of significant legal importance, as it may prevent similar speculative claims by employees in the future. Had the employee succeeded with their argument, the case could have set a dangerous precedent, forcing employers to refrain from terminating employment until the court ruled on the invalidity of the prior termination and the employee was reinstated. Otherwise, employers would risk being required to pay multiple wage compensations for overlapping periods.

The case was handled by the head of our labor law litigation team, Peter Džurný.