Fixed-term employment

How it works

Brent jurisprudence and later cases police fake terms. A 6-month term on a permanent EA role is endo adjacent. A 3-month cover for a maternity leave can be a real term. Write why the date exists. For a U.S. company hiring one Filipino teammate, write this into the brief, the employment contract, and the peso payroll file before the start date. Slack habits do not override the Labor Code, BIR, or NPC. If the local employer of record holds the paper, they run the statutory step; you still owe a clean operating definition so the seat does not fail in week three. Put a number on the example when you budget loaded cost, because a nameless allowance always returns as a December surprise or a missed SLA.

Example: cover for maternity 1 May-31 August. Ends 31 August. Offering ‘another term’ forever is regularization by another name.

How it differs

Project employment ends with the project, which may not be a calendar date. Probation is not a fixed term.

Common errors

Stacked 5-month terms with the same job description.

In practice

Treat Fixed-term employment as a week-one operating object. Ask who signs the notice, who remits, and who would answer DOLE. If three vendors each point at the other, you have a story rather than a file. Write an owner - founder, local employer, or worker - and a date you will look at it again: first cutoff, first holiday, or first miss. If nobody can show a contract clause, a payslip line, a calendar block, or a checklist box, you do not have fixed-term employment yet. You have a conversation. Convert the conversation before the person starts, while changing the deal still costs a paragraph rather than a resignation. Re-read the worked example above against the actual hire in front of you. If the numbers in that example cannot be swapped for this seat’s pesos, hours, and start date, the brief is still unfinished.