The Galician High Court, the Supreme Court of Justice of Galicia, later abbreviated as TSXG, reviewed and canceled a two-day employment and salary sanction that had been imposed on a worker. This case centers on allegations of sexual harassment in the workplace by a sales manager and the subsequent legal proceedings prompted by a complaint filed with the Civil Guard. The matter originated with a claim presented to the local Social Court in A Coruña, where the events unfolded and the first formal steps were taken in response to the alleged misconduct.
The employee initially reported the sexual harassment to the company’s Human Resources department in November 2020. Following an internal investigation, the company found the supervisor guilty of very serious misconduct included under the existing collective agreement and issued a suspension of 30 days of employment and salary to the sales manager. The worker challenged the sanction in court, filing a lawsuit against the employer before Social Court No. 2 in A Coruña, contending that the penalty was inappropriate given the circumstances and the severity of the alleged harassment.
Feeling that the punishment was not severe enough, the complainant pursued legal recourse and, a few months later, in January 2021, sought intervention from the Civil Guard. Shortly after this report, in mid-February, a separate incident occurred involving a vehicle delivery from the dealership in Cee. A customer, who depended on travel arrangements, required assistance that involved the employee guiding his son to help move the vehicle to the showroom area due to Covid restrictions that limited the dealership’s hours. The vehicle had to be prepared and moved in a way that complied with the reduced operating hours, which ended at 18:00. The customer arrived at 18:25, and the son entered through the vehicle bay to assist, ultimately accompanying the customer to the gas station for a courtesy refueling before taking delivery of the purchased vehicle.
A few days after the incident and about a month after the Civil Guard complaint, the employer decided to impose a fresh two-day work and salary penalty on the same worker, deducting 179.03 euros for alleged failure to follow instructions from superiors when operations ran beyond the 18:00 closing time. The case raised questions about the proper application of disciplinary measures and the interpretation of work hours during the period when health and safety rules were still in force.
The initial ruling by Social Court No. 1 of A Coruña declared the sanction against the employee invalid, prompting the concessionaire to appeal. The TSXG ultimately determined that the sanction was not void, but should be canceled, and it ordered the company to reimburse the deducted amount. The court clarified that the employee did not commit a serious disobedience to an authority and that the alleged breach could be categorized as a petty offense, especially considering the workshop hours and the absence of conclusive evidence that the employee remained on duty after the official closing time. The ruling also noted that the period in question was already subject to prescription and that the enforcement of the sanction had been laid out under a framework that did not support a harsher penalty given the circumstances. In light of these findings, the court emphasized that workers could be subject to disciplinary actions for disobedience in general, but the particular facts did not justify the severity of the two-day sanction and the related wage deduction.