Taiwaneese Man's Genius Plan To Extend Paid Leave Proved Lawful

A Taiwanese man married the same woman four times and divorced her thrice in a span of 37 days just so he could get his paid leaves extended.

The man, who has not been named, worked as a clerk at a bank in the city of Taipei in Taiwan.

The man got married on April 6 last year. He had applied for a paid leave for the marriage to which the bank approved and granted him eight days.

However, after eight days once his paid leave was over, he divorced his wife and married her again the very next day so he could apply for another paid leave, which he thought he was entitled to by the law.

The man divorced his wife thrice and married her four times. The man managed to apply for a total of 32 days of paid leave.

His plans went in vain after the bank got suspicious of his actions and later figured out his intentions. The bank rejected his application and refused to grant him extra paid leaves.

Despite the rejection, the man went ahead with his plan. He then lodged a complaint at the Taipei City Labour Bureau against his employer and accused the bank of not abiding the Article 2 of the Labour Leave Rules.

The law states that employees are entitled to eight days of paid leave when they get married. According to the man, since he got married four times, he should have received 32 days of paid leave.

The bureau investigated the complaint and ruled that the employer violated the Labour Law. The bank was fined NT$20,000 (706.39 USD approx.) in October last year.

In an appeal, the bank claimed that the employee’s "malicious abuse of marriage leave was not a legitimate cause of leave under the Labour Leave Rules", New Talk Taiwan reported.

Following the appeal, the Beishi Labour Bureau, on April 10, hesitantly upheld the previous ruling, saying that while the employee’s conduct was unethical, he had not broken the law. However, the bureau said that the bank had violated Article 2 of the Labour Leave Rules.