Claiming wages consists of demanding from the employer the payment of accrued and unpaid wages, which have their origin in the employment relationship. An additional amount of interest for late payment is allowed to be added to this claim, equivalent to 10% of annual labor interest on the amount claimed.
The deadline to present this type of claim is one year from when the debt is due, liquid and payable.
The process that a employee must follow to make a claim for an amount against his employer includes several phases:
Prior administrative conciliation. The employee must present a conciliation form to the corresponding Conciliation Service, in order to try to reach an agreement that avoids going to court. Once the conciliation act has been held, if the parties have not reached an agreement, the employee must fill a claim at the Social Court.
Judicial route. The claim in court can be made through the following procedural modalities:
Monitoring procedure. It is only applicable to those claims for amounts in which there are no disputes and its main advantage is that it is developed more quickly than the ordinary procedure. However, this modality is limited to the following cases:
1. Claims made by a employee against an employer who is not in bankruptcy proceedings 2. Claims made for amounts that do not exceed 6,000 euros in total 3. Claims for amounts due, due and of a specific amount that come from the employment relationship that both parties maintained or maintain, unless they are collective in nature.
If the request is accepted for processing, the employer must pay the amount claimed within a maximum period of 10 days. If you pay or deposit the full amount in court, the procedure will be archived and will be concluded. Otherwise, the Social Court will notify the employee so that, within a maximum period of 4 business days, they can present the corresponding claim in said court, thus initiating the ordinary procedure.
Ordinary procedure. In the event that the monitoring procedure has been initiated and the employer refuses to pay the amounts, or it cannot be initiated because the intended claim for the amount does not meet the requirements to do so (e.g. the amount claimed is greater than 6,000 euros), the employee must file a claim for the amount through the ordinary procedure, before the Labor Courts.
Additionally, in the event that there is a lack of payment of wages or a continued delay in payment, the employee may also request the termination of his or her employment contract due to serious and culpable breach by the employer. For this request to terminate the employment relationship to be considered fair, it will be understood that there is a delay in payment when the date set for payment of the salary is exceeded by fifteen days and said delay in the payment of the salary occurs for six months, not yet consecutive. Likewise, it will be understood that there are repeated non-payments when the employee is owed three full monthly payments of salary in a period of one year.
If the judge upholds this claim, he will terminate the employment relationship and grant the employee the right to receive compensation equivalent to unfair dismissal. Additionally, the employee will have the right to receive unemployment benefit if he or she meets the requirements to request it (e.g. minimum contribution period, etc.).
In the event that the company declares itself insolvent or is in bankruptcy proceedings, the Salary Guarantee Fund (FOGASA) will be responsible for paying the salaries owed and the compensation not received, with the quantitative limits established by law.
At ORTIZ PALMA ABOTADOS LABORALISTAS we are experts in claiming salaries and other amounts such as bonuses or compensation. We put at your disposal our knowledge and experience of 20 years of vocation to successfully obtain the amounts owed to you and place you in your best economic scenario.
