How to deal with staff who do not show up at work?

[UPDATED on 21-10-2021 by Miss Hồ Thị Thúy Hằng Senior Legal Advisor at PCA Company Services]

PROCESS OF HANDLING EMPLOYEES NOT PRESENT AT WORK WITHOUT ACCEPTABLE EXCUSES

Applied to employees who are 18 years or older with full legal capacity and act capacity as prescribed by law

• Regulations on handling employees not present at work without acceptable excuses

In case, the employee is not present at work, the Company can exercise the right to unilaterally terminate the labor contract or handle labor discipline, specifically:

• Company’s right to unilaterally terminate the contract

In case the employee is not present at work without acceptable excuses for at least 05 consecutive working days, the Company has the right to unilaterally terminate the labor contract. In this case, the Company does not need to notify the employee in advance.

To ensure the right to unilaterally terminate the labor contract legally in this case, the following conditions must be met:

• The employee is not present at work for at least 05 consecutive working days: 

This means that the employee quits the job without the consent of the Company, except in the case of leave due to the decision of the competent state agency. 

• The employee’s absence is without a justified reason:

The law stipulates justified reasons include natural disasters, fires; the employee or his/her family member suffers from illness with a certification by a competent health facility; and other reasons as stipulated in the internal labor regulations. Therefore, if not falling into the above cases, if the employee is not present at work, it is considered without a justified reason.

• There is evidence that the employee is not present at work for at least 05 consecutive working days, such as:

+ Minutes of employee’s absence certified by line manager(s) and other employees (witnesses).

+ Email, text(s) requesting the employee to come to the company to work.

+ If the employee has a leave request, there must be a written response or email response from the company’s competent person to refuse or not accept the employee’s leave.

• Company issues a Decision to terminate the labor contract with the employee. Note that this Decision must be issued in accordance with the authority and legal procedures.

• Disciplinary action against the employee

In case the employee is not present at work for 5 cumulative days within 30 days or 20 cumulative days within 365 days from the first day of absence without a justified reason, the Company is entitled to handle dismissal discipline for the employee.

Similar to case 1, the reason for disciplining the employee is:

• Voluntarily absent from work, not calculated continuously but counted as 05 cumulative days within 30 days or 20 days within 365 days. And
• Without a justified reason.

At the same time, to apply the dismissal discipline, the Company must strictly meet the labor discipline process, specifically:

• Legal documents and references:

• Labor Code 2019;
• Decree No. 145/2020/ND-CP dated December 14, 2020 detailing and guiding the implementation of a number of articles of the Labor Code on working conditions and labor relations.