The witness, Mr. Woldemariam: I don't know what a community center is, I know she worked with him, I don't know what a community center is"
(p. 10 of the transcript, paras. 1-35, emphasis added).
- Later in his testimony, the plaintiff noted that his wife worked at a community center (p. 13, para. 32 of Peru), contrary to his claim that he did not understand what was meant by the word "community center."
- Therefore, the plaintiff did not lift the burden imposed on him and did not prove that in March 2023 he was fired from his workplace, on the contrary - it appears in an unequivocal way that the plaintiff was not fired from the workplace, but rather that he was offered to move to another place in the same city (the community center in Rehovot), and he refused to do so. It was not proven by him that the alternative proposal constituted a deterioration of conditions for other reasons (nothing can be deduced from the transcript of the plaintiff's conversation with Mordechai, which according to the claim took place at the time regarding the alleged deterioration).
- It should be noted that even if we had reached the opposite result, according to which the plaintiff was fired, this would have no effect in the present case, whereas according to the expansion order in the cleaning industry, the full amount of compensation must be deposited (8.33% of the determining salary for the payment of severance pay), and the plaintiff did not file a claim for failure to give advance notice.
- The defendant, for its part, also did not claim that the advance notice fees, which she claimed were not deducted from the employee's salary beyond the letter of the law, should be deducted. The general argument in the statement of defense regarding the right to offset amounts that were overpaid (paragraph 29 of the statement of defense) does not meet the requirements of case law regarding the obligation to specify and quantify the cause of deduction. Therefore, for this reason as well, the determination regarding the circumstances of the plaintiff's termination of employment has no bearing on the outcome of the judgment.
Payment of travel fees on Shabbat
- The plaintiff petitions for payment of travel expenses for the period from 9/20 to 7/21. According to the plaintiff, throughout the entire period of work he worked on Saturdays - the weekly day of rest. According to him, since he was paid on a "monthly pass" basis and was required to arrive even on the day of rest, he is entitled to a difference in payment of travel allowances on the weekly rest days. The plaintiff petitions for payment in the amount of ILS 2,666 (ILS 20 for two directions * 4.3 weeks per month * 31 months of work).
- On the other hand, according to the defendant, in practice the plaintiff admits that the defendant paid him payments for travel expenses every month. She further adds that insofar as the plaintiff worked on Saturdays, he lived right next to the workplace and traveled on an electric bicycle. The plaintiff did not require public transportation and did not incur any expense in respect of this component. On the contrary, when the defendant paid the plaintiff travel expenses, even though he did not make payments for this component, she overpaid him for this component (paragraph 27 of the statement of defense).
- As will be detailed below, the lawsuit in respect of this component is to be dismissed.
- According to the ruling, an employee who needs public transportation to get to his place of work is entitled to his employer's participation in travel expenses, with the main criterion for determining whether the employee "needs transportation" is the distance between the employee's residence and his place of work. Insofar as it has not been proven otherwise, the premise is that an employee who lives at a distance of no more than 500 meters from his place of work, which is a reasonable walking distance, does not need public transportation (Labor Appeal 100/06 Tira Municipality v. Abd al-Rahman Kashua (May 22, 2006)).
- As for proving eligibility for reimbursement of travel fees, it was ruled that the employee has the burden of proving his entitlement as aforesaid, including what his expenses were and when he actually spent them. It was further ruled that it is necessary to be flexible with regard to the methods of proof when it is clear that the employee needed transportation in order to get to the workplace (see Request for Leave to Appeal (National) 65578-06-25 Alexander Duniev - A Slightly Different Solution in a Tax Appeal (September 25, 2025)).
- In the present case, there is an internal contradiction in the plaintiff's claims in the statement of claim. On the one hand, the plaintiff claimed that he received payment only for basic wages and nothing more than that (paragraph 14 of the statement of claim). On the other hand, he claimed that he was paid travel allowance on a monthly leave basis and that he was suing only for work on the weekly rest days (paragraphs 36-37 of the statement of claim). In addition, in the title of the statement of claim, it was noted that the claim is only for the months of 9/2020 - 7/2021, but the calculation of the entitlement was done for the entire period. Indeed, it appears that the plaintiff understood that there was an internal contradiction in his claims, and therefore in his affidavit he did not repeat the claim that he had received payment for this, but only referred to the transcription of a conversation, which he claimed proves that he was not paid for travel expenses (Appendix C to the plaintiff's affidavit).
- In the same conversation, the following things were said (also quoted above), which imply that there was a dispute regarding the plaintiff's entitlement to travel allowances. As stated there:
"Almog: What did we say in the ministry?