FACILITIES vs SUPPLEMENTS

• Facilities


  Articles or services for the benefit of the employee or his family but shall not include tools of the trade or articles or services primarily for the benefit of the employer or necessary to the conduct of the employer's business
• Value of facilities


  The fair and reasonable value of board, lodging and other facilities customarily furnished by an employer to his employees both in agricultural and non-agricultural enterprises
• Supplements


  Extra remuneration or special privileges or benefits given to or received by the laborers over and above their ordinary earnings or wages
• Supplements


  Benefits and privileges constituting extra remuneration over and above the ordinary earnings of the worker
• Determining if a privilege is a supplement or a facility


  1. Find out what its purpose is for

  2. Do not pay attention to the item, privilege or benefit itself
• Requirements for facilities to be deducted from wages


  • The employer must prove that the facility was customarily given by the trade
  • The employee must accept the provision of deductible facilities voluntarily and in writing
  • The facilities must be charged at their fair and reasonable value
• Facilities


  Benefit or privilege made part of the laborer's basic wage
• Supplements


  Benefit or privilege given to the employee which constitutes an extra remuneration over and above his basic or ordinary earning or wage
• The criterion is not so much with the kind of the benefit or item (food, lodging, bonus or sick leave) given but its purpose
• Free meals supplied by the ship operator to crew members, out of necessity, cannot be considered as facilities but supplements which could not be reduced having been given not as part of wages but as a necessary matter in the maintenance of the health and efficiency of the crew during the voyage
• Deductibility of facilities and supplements


  Facilities are deductible from wage but not supplements