The Amsterdam gym chain Saints & Stars must pay five former cleaners compensation of 15,000 euros because they were not dismissed according to the rules. The subdistrict court in Amsterdam ruled this on Tuesday. The luxury gym with four locations in Amsterdam has “acted in a seriously culpable manner” and “far exceeded the boundaries of careful employment practices,” writes the court.
The gym should not have simply terminated the cleaners’ employment contracts, according to the judge. There was also a “toxic working climate” on the work floor, caused by the manager of the cleaners. Other accusations about labor exploitation were not taken into account by the judge because the cleaners had not made them “sufficiently plausible”, according to the court.
Last summer revealed Het Parool that the Labor Inspectorate had intervened at Saints & Stars. At least 23 Filipino and Indonesian cleaners worked for the gym without a work permit and under harrowing conditions, the Amsterdam newspaper wrote.
The story led to much outrage, because the luxury of the gym – where Amsterdam residents can take unlimited sports classes called ‘Holy Booty’ and ‘Holy Shred’ from 135 euros per month – is in stark contrast to the experiences of the cleaners who Het Parool recorded. After publication, the windows of one of the locations were defaced, and according to owner Tom Moos, employees were spat at and threatened with death.
Eleven Philippine cleaners reported labor exploitation, and the Public Prosecution Service (OM) started a criminal investigation as a result. Also the Public Prosecution Service concluded at the end of October that there was no labor exploitation at Saints & Stars. However, criminal investigations into human smuggling and forgery are continuing.
‘Vulnerable position’
Tuesday’s ruling is in another labor law case that five of the Filipino cleaners have filed against the gym chain. They demanded payment of overdue salary, transition compensation and damages.
The five cleaners were in a “vulnerable and dependent position,” the judge wrote in the judgment. They worked for Saints & Stars without a work permit for “several weeks” and lived in a building owned by gym owner Tom Moos during that period. According to the cleaners, they slept in a walk-in closet or in bed with strangers.
The cleaners also say that their passports have been confiscated and that they have been forced to work long hours: up to sixteen hours a day, without a break. Sometimes they had to work at night, sometimes for seven days in a row. After a few weeks they were suddenly fired and put out on the street without wages being paid. Saints & Stars denies the allegations.
Conflicting statements
According to the court, the cleaners have been able to demonstrate sufficiently that they are “structurally under pressure.” [zijn] ” by their manager, who “tracked them down harshly and threatened them with a reduction in wages or even dismissal if their work did not meet the strict quality requirements.”
Saints & Stars should also not have simply dismissed the cleaners, the gym is to blame for the fact that they were working without a permit and that promises about arranging a work visa were not kept. In addition to the compensation of 15,000 euros, the gym must pay the cleaners the overdue salary, holiday pay, a transition payment and compensation for the sudden dismissal.
But the cleaners were unable to convince the judge that their passports were confiscated, that they were forced to work long hours for low pay and that they lived in Moos’s building under appalling conditions. The cleaners made conflicting statements about this and had insufficient supporting evidence.
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