G.R. No. 218072 - METROPOLITAN NAGA WATER DISTRICT, VIRGINIA I. NERO, JEREMIAS P. ABAN JR., AND EMMA A. CUYO, VS. COMMISSION ON AUDIT.DECISION - Supreme Court E-Library

Ruling

Accordingly, MNWD was without basis in claiming COLA back payments because the same had already been integrated into the salaries received by its employees. Moreover, MNWD's reliance in PPA Employees is misplaced. The circumstances in the case at bench clearly differ from those in PPA Employees to warrant its application. In Napocor Employees Consolidated Union v. The National Power Corporation (Napocor) , [21] as cited in MIA , the Court clarified that the PPA Employees was inapplicable where there was no issue as to the incumbency of the employees, to wit: In setting aside COA's ruling, we held in PPA Employees that there was no basis to use the elements of incumbency and prior receipt as standards to discriminate against the petitioners therein. For, DBM-CCC No. 10, upon which the incumbency and prior receipt requirements are contextually predicated, was in legal limbo from July 1, 1989 (effective date of the unpublished DBM-CCC No. 10) to March 16, 1999 (date of effectivity of the heretofore unpublished DBM circular). And being in legal limbo, the benefits otherwise covered by the circular, if properly published, were likewise in legal limbo as they cannot be classified either as effectively integrated or not integrated benefits. There lies the difference. Here, the employee welfare allowance was, as above demonstrated, integrated by NPC into the employees' standardized salary rates effective July 1, 1989 pursuant to Rep. Act No. 6758. Unlike in PPA Employees , the element of discrimination between incumbents as of July 1, 1989 and those joining the force thereafter is not obtaining in this case. And while after July 1, 1989, PPA employees can rightfully complain about the discontinuance of payment of COLA and amelioration allowance effected due to the incumbency and prior receipt requirements set forth in DBM-CCC No. 10, NPC cannot do likewise with respect to their welfare allowance since NPC has, for all intents and purposes, never really discontinued the payment thereof. To stress, herein petitioners failed to establish that they suffered a diminution in pay as a consequence of the consolidation of the employee welfare allowance into their standardized salary. There is thus nothing in this case which can be the subject of a back pay since the amount corresponding to the employee welfare allowance was never in the first place withheld from the petitioners. [22] In PPA Employees , the crux of the issue was whether it was appropriate to distinguish between employees hired before and after July 1, 1989 in allowing the back payment of the COLA. In the said case, the Court ruled that there was no substantial difference between employees hired before July 1, 1989 and those hired thereafter to warrant the exclusion of the latter from COLA back payment. It is important to highlight that, in PPA Employees , the COLA was paid on top of the salaries received by the employees therein before it was discontinued. The COA noted that the MNWD employees nev