Recently, the Shanghai and Jiangsu province High People’s Courts respectively publicized their own list of 10 model case studies in relation to employment disputes that occurred from 2016 to 2018. Although China does not have a case-law system with binding precedent, the model cases posted by the high people’s courts, or the Supreme People’s Court (SPC), may provide guidance to lower courts on the handling of similar cases.
The model cases focused on various traditional topics such as labour dispatch, the protection of special employees who are taking maternity leave or long-term sick leave, etc. Below is a summary of a few of the case studies that focused on more recently trending issues.
Non-compete issues
In one Shanghai case, the employee agreed to perform a post-termination non-compete obligation. In consideration of that, the employer granted restricted stock units to the employee during his employment term. Both parties agreed that the employee should repay all economic gains made from the restricted stock units to the employer if the employee breached the non-compete obligation.
In other words, the non-compete compensation was paid during the employment term in the form of restricted stock units rather than in cash, and the liquidated damages for breach of non-compete was the repayment of the restricted stock gains. Under the law, the non-compete compensation generally should be paid in cash on a monthly basis following termination of employment. However, the court in this case validated the arrangement and supported the employer’s claim. The employee who breached the non-compete obligation eventually repaid the employer more than RMB1.9 million (US$271,000) of the restricted stock gains.
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