BE WARY OF THE USE OF VULGAR LANGUAGE IN FRONT OF A FEMALE COLLEAGUE AT WORK, OTHERWISE RISK OF BEING FIRED
14/02/2018
FROM THE COURT OF APPEALS IN MILAN
The company challenged a worker to have made two inappropriate phone calls in the presence of a colleague. The content of the charge made by the company was: "During the first phone call, notwithstanding the presence of her colleague in the room, with a tone of voice that made the content of her conversation clearly audible to the other, verbatim was: "This job makes me sick, I can’t wait to leave this department" and then continued, "I leave at 3.00 pm; at 4.00 pm I'm home and we can have extreme sex.” Subsequently, after being absent from the room for a few minutes, still uncaring of the presence of her colleague, she made a second phone call from the company landline, during which she said the following, "I’m in the car, if you want we can go to the motel. I prefer the one with the square shower", specifying "I don’t care if you don’t have the right underwear"; then he asked the receiver of the phone call if the webcam of her company PC was active and invited her to "lift up her sweater to see what was underneath", finally specifying to the interlocutor "I'm not alone in the office."
Referring to the above facts, the company challenged the worker:
"to have pronounced phrases with content that was objectively contrary to the normal sense of decency at the workplace and in the presence of a colleague, to have consequently had irremediable behaviour towards his colleague, to have improperly used company tools assigned to him to be used in her job. The behaviours he had, even considered individually, constituted serious breach of the normal rules of civil life, as well as the provisions of the current CCNL, the current code of ethics and duties of care, observance, good faith, correctness and collaboration as part of the work relationship ... ".
The worker challenged her dismissal before the Court of Milan that declared it illegitimate, ordering reintegration into the workplace and compensation for damages, sentencing the employer to pay the court costs. The company appealed against the ruling. The Court of Appeals of Milan, reforming the sentence, confirmed the illegitimacy of the dismissal but did not recognize the right of the worker to reintegrate in the workplace, thus condemning the company only to pay compensation equal to 18 months’ salary. but without his keeping the job. The trial costs incurred by the worker were charged to the worker, while the first-instance costs were compensated. Court of Appeals of Milan. Judge Picciau.
Sentence n. 41/2018 publ. 12/01/2018
In Italy, employees were protected by art. 18 of act n. 300/1970 (usually called “employees statue”), until 2014: workers unjustly fired could sue their employer for being reinstated to their job and for damages (salaries from firing to reinstating). So, if the judge had declared unlawful dismissal, companies had to pay years of salary and social security contribution, even if they didn’t’ get any job performance by fired employees (Italian trials were really slow). From 2015, this won’t happen anymore. In case of unlawful dismissal, employers will only have to pay damages to workers. This compensation will be reasonable: from 4 to 24 months of salary (2 months per year of working). Employees won’t have the right to be reinstated to their job, except for specific situations. So, if he doesn’t appreciate the worker, the employer won’t be obliged to readmit him in his company (except for racial, political and religious discrimination). According to new acts, civil trials are faster, thanks to their computerization. Now payment orders can be issued in a few days. Before, it took several months. Besides, debtors that refuse payments are obliged to pay default interest of 9%. So they have no incentive to delay payments: this would be too expensive. Creditors can ask the court for an order to search in public records debtor’s goods and current accounts to be attached (now access to records is allowed only to specialized agencies) . This new procedural instrument allows to attack debtor's assets more easily. Creditors will be satisfied effectively and more quickly. In this section of the website, we are going to show all this brandnew rules.
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