Facts
Employees B. and C. concluded two new employment contracts each with employer A. AG, retroactively effective as of January 1, 1996, on April 2, 1996. Since the beginning of 1998, the relationship between the parties had deteriorated, as the employer was planning a reorganization that the employees did not agree with. By letter dated October 27, 1998, the employees terminated their employment contracts with immediate effect.
On December 28, 2000 and February 9, 2001, the employees filed a lawsuit against the employer to assert claims for damages from the justified immediate termination of their employment contracts. The Labor Court of Zurich partially upheld the claims and ordered the employer to pay damages. The High Court of the Canton of Zurich overturned the first-instance judgment and referred the proceedings back to the first instance for continuation or supplementation in accordance with the considerations. The Labor Court of Zurich then partially upheld the claims with a judgment dated October 10, 2016 and obliged the employer to pay damages.
Considerations
The Federal Supreme Court took up the employer's appeal and dismissed it. It stated that the appeal was admissible, as it was directed exclusively against the considerations in the decision of the High Court of the Canton of Zurich dated September 21, 2006, in which the legality of the employees' immediate termination had been conclusively assessed. Since the appeal was not directed against the final decision of the Labor Court of October 10, 2016, but only against the considerations that had become binding in that decision, the appeal was admissible.
The Federal Supreme Court further stated that the…