[Plaintiffs, Respondents and Appellants] As indicated in the list of plaintiffs in the attached appendix. (Attorneys for the plaintiffs: Law Firm Yeoneun, Attorney Kwon Doo-seop and 3 others)
[Defendant, Appellant and Respondent] S&T Energy Co., Ltd. (formerly: S&TC Co., Ltd.) (Attorneys for the defendant: Yulchon LLC, Attorney Kang Seok-hoon and 4 others)
[Judgment Below] Busan High Court Judgment (Changwon) 2015Na277, decided December 10, 2015
[Order]
The part of the judgment below against the plaintiffs is reversed, and this part of the case is remanded to the Busan High Court. All of the defendant's appeals are dismissed.
[Reasoning] The grounds of appeal are examined.
1. As to the plaintiffs' grounds of appeal
A. Ordinary wages, which the Labor Standards Act (근로기준법) prescribes as the standard for calculating additional wages for extended, night, and holiday work, refer to wages paid regularly, uniformly, and fixedly as money or goods agreed to be paid as consideration for prescribed work, which is the work ordinarily provided by an employee during prescribed working hours. Here, "fixedness" means the characteristic whereby, if an employee provides prescribed work on any given day, payment is scheduled to be made as a matter of course regardless of whether performance, results, or other additional conditions are satisfied (see Supreme Court en banc Decision 2012Da89399, decided December 18, 2013, etc.).
B. According to the record, the following facts can be established.
1) In the collective agreement concluded between the defendant and the S&TC Branch of the Korean Metal Workers' Union (전국금속노동조합 에스앤티씨지회) (hereinafter "the labor union in this case"), it was agreed that wages would be increased effective April 1 of each year (hereinafter "the retroactive reference date"), and that in cases where wage negotiations were delayed, the increase would be retroactively applied.
2) When an agreement on wage increase was reached between the defendant and the labor union in this case after the retroactive reference date, the defendant paid to the employees the wage increase amount corresponding to the period from the retroactive reference date until the agreement was reached (hereinafter, the portion of the retroactively paid wages corresponding to the base pay and bonuses is referred to as "the retroactive wage increase amount").
C. In this case, the retroactive wage increase amount should be deemed to fall under the ordinary wages prescribed in Article 6 of the Enforcement Decree of the Labor Standards Act (근로기준법 시행령). The reasons are as follows.
1) Ordinary wages refer to money or goods paid to an employee as consideration for prescribed work, and here, prescribed work means the work ordinarily provided by the employee during prescribed working hours. What constitutes consideration for prescribed work must be determined based on how the employee and the employer evaluated the value of the employee's work that was agreed to be ordinarily provided during prescribed working hours, and how much money or goods were agreed to be paid therefor.
Wages that an employee additionally receives from the employer by providing work beyond the prescribed working hours or by specially providing work beyond what was agreed to be provided under the employment contract, or wages received irrespective of prescribed work, cannot be considered consideration for prescribed work. However, insofar as the employee and the employer evaluated the value of the prescribed work and determined the payment as consideration therefor, it cannot be said that such payment is not ordinary wages merely because it was retroactively applied due to the incidental circumstance of delay in collective bargaining. In this case, the retroactive wage increase amount appears to have been paid as consideration for the evaluation of the value of the prescribed work, rather than being paid for work exceeding prescribed working hours or work beyond ordinary work, or being paid irrespective of prescribed work.
2) Whether a certain wage falls under ordinary wages must be determined according to its objective nature. Even if it is a retroactive wage increase amount, if the collective agreement, etc. designates it as a wage falling under the statutory ordinary wages, such as base pay or regular bonuses, its nature is identical to that of the original wage.
Even though, at the time the employees provided prescribed work after the retroactive reference date and before the wage increase agreement, the fact of a wage increase or its extent was not specifically determined, the employees could expect that, if wages were increased pursuant to the annually repeated agreements, they would receive the retroactive wage increase amount for the period after the retroactive reference date, and it can be viewed that, by virtue of the effect of the labor-management agreement on retroactive application, the consideration for prescribed work after the retroactive reference date was determined based on the increased base pay. In other words, through such labor-management agreement, only the timing of the additional valuation of the prescribed work was inevitably postponed to a point after the work was provided, and accordingly, the retroactive wage increase amount in this case is not something that an employee receives only upon satisfying additional conditions such as achievement of performance or results, but is something that is naturally paid as compensation for the provision of prescribed work, and therefore must be deemed to possess fixedness.
3) The defendant did not pay the retroactive wage increase amount to employees who had retired before the wage increase agreement was reached. However, this is merely a result arising from the fact that the effect of a collective agreement retroactively changing the standards for determining wages and other working conditions does not extend to employees who had already retired before the conclusion of the collective agreement, and therefore this cannot be a reason to view differently the nature of the retroactive wage increase amount in this case, which was naturally paid as compensation to employees who provided prescribed work.
D. Nevertheless, the court below determined that the retroactive wage increase amount did not fall under ordinary wages, citing only the circumstances stated in its reasoning. Such determination by the court below contains an error that misapprehends the legal principles concerning ordinary wages and thereby affected the outcome of the judgment. The plaintiffs' ground of appeal pointing this out has merit.
2. As to the defendant's grounds of appeal
A. As to Ground of Appeal No. 1
The court below determined that the bonus in this case constitutes ordinary wages as wages paid regularly, uniformly, and fixedly to employees as consideration for prescribed work, and that even though the family allowance, which is difficult to consider as falling under ordinary wages, is partially included in the basis for calculating the bonus in this case, this does not mean that the entire bonus in this case, or the portion of the bonus in this case calculated based on the family allowance, is excluded from ordinary wages.
Upon examination in light of the record, the above determination by the court below does not contain an error of misapprehending the legal principles concerning ordinary wages, as alleged in the grounds of appeal.
B. As to Ground of Appeal No. 2
The court below determined, for the reasons stated in its reasoning, that it is difficult to conclude that the payment of additional statutory allowances and retirement pay recalculated by including the bonus in this case in ordinary wages would cause serious managerial difficulties to the defendant or endanger the survival of the enterprise, and accordingly rejected the defendant's defense based on the principle of good faith.
Upon examination of the reasoning of the judgment below in light of the relevant legal principles and the record, the above determination by the court below does not contain an error of misapprehending the legal principles concerning the principle of good faith, as alleged in the grounds of appeal.
3. Conclusion
Therefore, the part of the judgment below against the plaintiffs is reversed, and this part of the case is remanded to the court below for further hearing and determination. The defendant's appeal against the plaintiffs is without merit and is therefore dismissed in its entirety. This Judgment is rendered as set forth in the Order by the unanimous opinion of the Justices participating in the adjudication.
[Appendix] List of Plaintiffs: Omitted
Justice Kim Seon-su (Presiding Justice), Park Jeong-hwa, Noh Tae-ak, Oh Gyeong-mi (Justice in charge)