LPA Section 17 — End of the employment contract and notice of termination

A fixed-term employment contract ends when its term expires, without notice. Where the contract has no fixed term, the employer or the employee may end it by written notice given on or before a pay date, taking effect at the next pay date; notice longer than three months need not be given, and a probation contract counts as a contract with no fixed term. The employer may instead pay the wages due up to the end of the notice period and have the employee leave at once. Under section 17/1, an employer who ends a contract without giving that notice must pay the wages the employee would have received from the day he leaves to the day the termination would have taken effect, on the day he leaves; a breach is punishable under section 144(1). The advance-notice requirement does not apply where the employer lawfully terminates for serious cause: section 17 carves out dismissal on the section 119 grounds and summary dismissal under section 583 of the Civil and Commercial Code from the notice duty.