Floating status

How it works

Jurisprudence gives floating status a short leash, often discussed around six months in security and similar sectors. Dumping a WFH bookkeeper on ‘float’ without pay because pipeline dipped is constructive-dismissal material. 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: no invoices this month so you stop peso pay and say ‘stand by.’ After weeks, the worker files. You did not have a lawful float. You had a silent layoff.

How it differs

Authorized cause is how you downsize for real. Constructive dismissal is what a fake float becomes.

Common errors

Renaming bench time as floating status to skip pay.

In practice

Treat Floating status 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 floating status 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.