An employee demanded, among other things, from a person who was the owner of all shares of the company, its manager and sole director, payment for deficiencies and irregularities in pension deductions that occurred during his employment.
The Labor Court accepted the motion and pierced the corporate veil in order to personally obligate the shareholder. While the starting point is that the principle of a separate legal entity must be given effect, in exceptional cases it is possible to attribute a company debt to a shareholder and pierce the corporate veil either fully or partially. Such exceptional cases are when it can be shown that the company exploited the principle of the separate legal entity for fraudulent purposes, when the company is used as an illegal cover for the shareholder's activities or when the shareholder regularly mixes his private assets with the company's assets so that in practice there is no separate legal entity. Here, employee approached the shareholder and notified him about the partial payments and the lack of payments at least in part of the time of employment and the shareholder was responsible for giving instructions to the company's finance department and could act to correct the aforementioned and therefore there is justification for piercing the corporate veil and charging him personally at least partially.