Article 684-E Federal Labor Law

The conciliation procedure shall be processed in accordance with the following rules:

I.It shall begin with the presentation of the conciliation request before the Federal Conciliation and Labor Registry Center (Centro Federal de Conciliación y Registro Laboral) or before the corresponding local Conciliation Center, signed by the applicant, to which a copy of the official identification referred to in section I of article 684-C shall be attached; in the case of enterprises or labor unions it shall be subscribed by their legal representative;

II.The Conciliation Centers may receive the conciliation requests by personal appearance of the interested parties, by duly signed writing, or, where applicable, by electronic means through the computer system implemented for that purpose;

III.The Conciliation Centers shall assist the interested parties that so request it to prepare their petition. They must provide legal advice free of charge regarding their rights and the prescription periods thereof, as well as regarding the conciliation and jurisdictional procedures to solve labor conflicts;

IV.At the moment in which it receives the request, the conciliating authority shall set the day and hour for the holding of a Conciliation Hearing, which must be held within the following fifteen days. The summons shall be notified personally to the employer at least five days in advance of the hearing, warning him that if he does not appear by himself or through his legal representative, or through an attorney with sufficient powers, a fine between 50 and 100 times the Measurement and Updating Unit (Unidad de Medida y Actualización) shall be imposed on him, and he shall be considered in disagreement with any conciliatory arrangement;

V.Upon receiving the conciliation request, the conciliating authority shall assign a unique identification number and an electronic mailbox to the interested party, which shall be created for communications as regards the prejudicial conciliation procedure. Finally, it shall designate a conciliation room by turn.

In the event of not being competent, the Conciliating Authority must send the request to the competent Conciliation Center by electronic means, within the twenty-four hours following receipt of the request, which it must notify to the applicant so that he/she goes before it to continue the procedure. The Conciliating Authority shall rule regarding the legal standing when dealing with requests of legal persons;

VI.If the conciliation request is presented personally by both parties, the conciliating authority shall notify them immediately of the date and hour of the conciliation hearing, which must be held within a maximum term of five days from the date of presentation of the request, without prejudice to the fact that it may be held at that moment;

VII.The employee requesting the conciliation instance must attend the hearing personally. He/she may attend accompanied by a person of his/her confidence, but the latter shall not be recognized as an attorney, as it is a conciliation procedure and not a trial; nevertheless, the employee may also be assisted by a law graduate, attorney or a Procurator of the Defense of Labor. The employer must attend personally or through a representative with sufficient powers to bind him/herself in his/her name;

VIII.If the parties attend the hearing, the Conciliating Authority must require them to identify themselves with any official document and, where applicable, verify that the person who appears in representation of the legal person accredits his/her legal standing.

An electronic mailbox shall also be assigned to the summoned party to receive notifications in the prejudicial conciliation procedure; having done the foregoing, it shall formulate a proposal of the content and scope of a conciliatory arrangement, raising options of just and equitable solution that in its judgment are adequate to consider the controversy terminated; if the parties are in agreement, they shall enter into a written agreement, which must be ratified in that act, a certified copy thereof being delivered.

If no agreement is reached, the Conciliating Authority shall issue the record of having exhausted the mandatory prejudicial conciliation stage. Nevertheless, the parties by mutual agreement may request that a new conciliation hearing be set, which must be held within the following five days;

IX.When one of the parties or both do not appear at the conciliation hearing for justified cause, despite being duly notified, a new date and hour shall be set for the holding of the hearing, which must be carried out within the following five days. The party that attends shall be notified in that act, the counterparty that does not attend shall be notified through the bulletin of the Center and, where applicable, through electronic mailbox;

X.If only the applicant appears at the conciliation hearing, the conciliating authority shall issue the record of having exhausted the mandatory prejudicial conciliation stage. If only the summoned party appears, the file shall be archived for lack of interest of the applicant. In both cases the prescription periods shall be resumed as of the day following the date of the hearing, preserving the rights of the employee to request conciliation again;

XI.In the event that the notifier has not managed to notify the person, enterprise or labor union to be summoned, despite having attempted it, the Conciliating Authority shall consider the instance terminated and shall issue a record preserving the rights of the applicant for conciliation to bring action before the competent Court;

XII.When in the conciliation request the existence of sexual harassment, discrimination or other acts of violence contemplated by law is stated, in which there exists the imminent risk of re-victimization, the conciliating authority shall take the measures conducive to ensuring that at no time the summoned person to whom such acts are attributed is gathered with or confronted by the other; in these cases the conciliation procedure shall be carried out with the representative or attorney of the summoned party, avoiding that the presumed victim and the person or persons to whom the acts of violence are attributed gather or meet in the same space;

XIII.Once the agreement is entered into before the Conciliation Centers, it shall acquire the condition of res judicata, having the quality of a title to initiate executive actions without need of ratification. Either of the parties may promote its compliance through the sentence execution procedure established by this Law, before the competent Court, and

XIV.Upon entering into an agreement, the Conciliating Authorities shall deliver a certified copy thereof to each of the parties; likewise, they shall also be delivered a certified copy of the records in which compliance with the agreement is recorded.

Without prejudice to the foregoing, when the applicant so requires, the Conciliation Center may set the Conciliation Hearing within the five business days following the presentation of the request, for which it shall provide him/her with the summons to the hearing so that the applicant takes charge of delivering it directly to the summoned person or persons. In this case, if both parties appear at the conciliation hearing, it shall proceed to be held. If the applicant does not appear at the hearing, the matter shall be archived for lack of interest, without issuance of the record of having exhausted the conciliation, unless he/she justifies his/her non-attendance, in the judgment of the conciliator. If only the applicant for conciliation appears, a new date and hour shall be set for the conciliation hearing within the following fifteen days, adjusting to the rules of the procedure provided in sections IV and VI to XIV of this article; in said conciliation hearing, the Conciliation Center shall proceed to geolocate the domicile of the summoned party with the assistance of the applicant; in the event that it cannot geolocate it, the Conciliation Center shall set an appointment so that, accompanied by the interested party, the corresponding summons is carried out.

The Conciliating Authority is responsible for the agreement entered into complying with the requirements and benefits established by this Law, applicable to the specific case. If the parties comply voluntarily with the agreement entered into, it shall certify said circumstance, attesting that the employee receives completely and personally the payment agreed in the agreement.

In the event that the parties establish deferred payments, in one or more installments to be paid on a date different from the entering into of the agreement, a conventional penalty must be set for the case of non-compliance; this shall consist of an amount not less than the daily wage of the employee for each day that passes without full compliance with the agreement.