Instead of two million rubles, L'Etoile collected less than 40 thousand from former employees, and must pay them many times more

In Kemerovo and Novokuznetsk, there is a dispute between the L'Etoile perfumery store and workers fired from it for a shortage. At the beginning of May, the courts made decisions in these cases: the dismissals were declared illegal, but the money for the shortage was still recovered, though 2 million rubles less.

Both our website and the weekly "MK in Kuzbass" have already written about this high-profile case: in October 2010, an inventory of goods was carried out in the L'Etoile store in the Greenwich shopping center in Kemerovo, as a result of which a shortage was established. . The inspectors came to the conclusion that the employer (Alkor-Novokuznetsk LLC) suffered material damage in the amount of 2,099,382 rubles. The workers were hastily dismissed from work and after a few days 9 people were fired due to "loss of confidence", as reported on the organization's website, it was decided to recover the amount of material damage from 17 workers through the courts.

Since November 2010, in the Kuibyshevsky District Court of Novokuznetsk, a lawsuit has been going on on the claim of workers for reinstatement and refutation of information posted on the Internet.

“The first decision surprised everyone – it seems, even the judges of the regional court – the workers’ claim was denied, the court recognized the employer’s actions as justified,” says Dmitry Malinin, chairman of the YurProekt Bar Association, which defended the interests of the laid-off workers. – However, the Kemerovo Regional Court reversed this decision and sent the case back for a new trial. On May 12 of this year, new judicial acts were adopted: the dismissals of 4 out of 5 employees who appealed against their dismissal were declared illegal. The court ordered Alkor-Novokuznetsk LLC to pay in favor of each former employee the average monthly salary for each month from the moment of dismissal, as well as moral damages in the amount of 10 to 30 thousand rubles. The victory entitles employees to additionally demand full reimbursement of legal fees.”

In parallel with this process, the Leninsky District Court of Kemerovo heard a case on the claim of the employer against 17 employees for the recovery of 2,099,382 rubles.

On May 4, Judge Tatyana Bolshakova ruled: since the employees signed an agreement on full collective liability, they must be responsible for the goods, regardless of whether they carried it themselves or the buyers, or whether there was an error in accounting or during the inventory. & nbsp ;

However, the amount was recognized as justified many times less than the employer stated - only 39,858.99 rubles. From part of the workers, the court recovered the amount of material damage - from 2000 to 5500 rubles. Thus, the lawyers of the workers managed to win back claims for more than two million rubles! How did you manage to reduce the amount recovered from 2 million to 40 thousand?

“We had a question, for how long is the shortage required from workers,” says Dmitry Malinin. - Representatives of Alkor-Novokuznetsk LLC tried to "hang" the shortage on their employees based on the inventory for the period from April to October 2010, but the original agreements on full collective liability dated January 1, 2010 were not in the file, there was only a signed employees contract dated September 1, 2010. As a result, it turned out that the full collective liability came on September 1 and ended in fact on October 6, when the inventory was completed. And it was during this period, as the inventory shows, that L'Etoile missed the number of goods with certain barcodes in the amount of 39,858 rubles. 99 kop. But goods with these barcodes could have been stolen even before the inventory.”

Considering the inventory to be illegal in general, the workers plan to appeal against this court decision.

Author

Dmitriy Alexandrovich Malinin

Chairman of the Bar Association "Jurproekt"