The defendant shall be innocent.

1. The Defendant, as the actual representative of the K-si, Nowon-gu, Seoul Special Metropolitan City Development Bank D, the Defendant is an employer who runs a manufacturing business with four regular workers at the above workplace, working from December 15, 2014 to March 18, 2015 at the above workplace.

The retirement E's wages of KRW 3,548,825, including wages of KRW 2,410,700, and monthly wages of KRW 1,138,125 in February 2015, did not pay KRW 3,548,825 within 14 days from the date on which the cause for the payment occurred without agreement between the parties to the extension of the payment date.

2. Determination

A. The Defendant asserts that there is no unpaid wage since the Defendant offsets the material price and the amount of each wage specified in the facts charged by free set-off agreement between E and E, who is an employee.

B. The main text of Article 43(1) of the Labor Standards Act declares the principle of direct payment of the full amount of wages by stipulating that “The wages shall be paid in full in currency directly to an employee.” This is to protect an employee by unilaterally prohibiting an employer from unilaterally deducting wages so as not to threaten the economic life of the employee by receiving the full amount of wages from the employee. Therefore, it is prohibited that an employer unilaterally offsets the employee’s wage claims with the claims against the employee with the employer.

However, if there is objective reason to believe that the employer's consent was based on the free will of the worker when the employer offsets against the worker's wage claims with the worker's consent, it shall not be contrary to the purport of the above provision. However, the determination that the consent was based on the worker's free will should be strictly and carefully conducted.

(see, e.g., Supreme Court Decision 2001Da25184, Oct. 23, 2001). According to the records of this case, the Defendant is a member of the Dispute Resolution Co., Ltd. on March 2015.