G.R. No. 144978; January 15, 2002
UNIVERSAL ROBINA CORPORATION, and/or LANCE Y. GOKONGWEI, petitioners, vs. COURT OF APPEALS, NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS COMMISSION, CARLOS YGAÑA, LIBORIO VILLAFLOR and RONALDO CARDINALES, respondents.

FACTS

Respondents, former employees of an affiliate of petitioner Universal Robina Corporation, retired and received retirement benefits under the company plan. Following the enactment of Republic Act No. 7641, which provided more liberal retirement benefits, respondents filed a complaint before the National Labor Relations Commission (NLRC) claiming entitlement to the enhanced benefits retroactively. The Labor Arbiter ruled in their favor. The NLRC affirmed this decision in a Resolution received by petitioners on November 11, 1999. Petitioners filed a motion for reconsideration, which the NLRC denied in a Resolution received by petitioners on March 14, 2000.
On May 15, 2000, petitioners filed a Petition for Certiorari with the Court of Appeals (CA). The CA dismissed the petition as filed out of time. It computed the 60-day reglementary period under Rule 65 from petitioners’ receipt of the original NLRC Resolution (November 11, 1999), not from the receipt of the resolution denying the motion for reconsideration (March 14, 2000). The CA applied the rule as amended by the Supreme Court’s July 21, 1998 Resolution, which stated that the period is interrupted by a timely motion for reconsideration, but the remaining period, which shall not be less than five days, is reckoned from notice of the denial.

ISSUE

Whether the Petition for Certiorari filed with the Court of Appeals was filed on time.

RULING

Yes, the petition was filed on time. The Supreme Court granted the petition and set aside the CA’s resolutions. The Court clarified the applicable procedural rule for counting the 60-day period to file a petition for certiorari under Rule 65. While the CA correctly applied the rule as it stood at the time of its decision (the July 21, 1998 amendment), this rule was subsequently amended by the Court in A.M. No. 00-2-03-SC, which took effect on September 1, 2000. The new amendment explicitly provides: “the sixty (60) day period shall be counted from notice of the denial of the said motion.”
This amendment is procedural and remedial in character. It does not create new rights or impair vested ones but merely operates in furtherance of the remedy. Consequently, procedural rules are generally given retroactive effect to actions pending and undetermined at the time of their passage. Applying this retroactive effect, the 60-day period for petitioners should be reckoned from March 14, 2000, the date they received the NLRC resolution denying their motion for reconsideration. Counting from that date, the 60th day fell on a Saturday, May 13, 2000. Therefore, petitioners had until the next working day, Monday, May 15, 2000, to file their petition, which they did. The case was remanded to the CA for further proceedings.