"I Was Looking For 20 Rubles, But Ended Up With 8,000."
- 19.08.2026, 9:16
The Story of a Side Job.
Ilya recalls the details of that fateful day, after which he ended up owing a large sum: “At first, I refused to deliver the paint, and my wife tried to talk me out of it, too. But I thought: I need to help the guy, and 20 rubles wouldn’t hurt.” The young man says that by that point he had already found another job, but he agreed to the trip anyway. That day, the cargo ended up on the road, and then the whole saga began—with paperwork, court cases, and a debt of nearly 8,000 rubles, writes “Onliner”.
“The Paint Pyramid Set Off”
This story took place back in the summer of 2024, but the legal proceedings dragged on for a long time. It all started when Ilya finished his military service, returned to his hometown, and began looking for a job. In May, he began working with a sole proprietor (Ilya calls this “off-the-books work,” while the business owner presented a different version to the court—we’ll discuss that below).
The young man says he handled freight transport, furniture assembly, and unloading for the sole proprietor, but by the end of August he had already found another job with a stable income and official employment status and was planning to quit. He understood that he was working off the books, but at the time he didn’t think much of it—as it turned out, he was wrong.
Later, the question of exactly when Ilya began working officially for the sole proprietor became important to the court. The young man himself insisted: if he already had a referral for a medical examination for his new employer on August 21 (he provided a copy of the document to the editorial office), and he did indeed start working there on September 3 (as noted in the court records), then it made no sense for him to be hired by the sole proprietor for a permanent position on August 28. According to his account, he signed the employment application dated August 28 only after the incident with the paint, and he hadn’t even undergone the medical examination required to work as a driver for the sole proprietor.
But let’s go back to the day the incident occurred. On August 29, Ilya was undergoing a medical exam at the clinic when the sole proprietor called him and asked him to deliver the paint to a factory in Bobruisk.
“At first, I refused to transport the paint, and my wife tried to talk me out of it too. But I thought: I need to help the guy, and 20 rubles won’t hurt.” I loaded up the truck and set off.
Ilya recalls that he hit the brakes while driving, the paint shifted forward, and part of the load fell out.
— There was a pallet with a mountain of paint—dozens of buckets. The car braked, and that pyramid of paint just started rolling.
The driver decided not to stop right on the roadway because it was one of the busiest streets, and the paint and varnish could catch fire. It later came to light that four containers were damaged when the truck braked, causing the paint to spill across about 2 kilometers of the road.
At the factory, the paint was unloaded, and traffic police officers spoke with Ilya there: they told him the paint needed to be removed from the road and verified that the vehicle was registered to a sole proprietor, while the young man himself was trying to clean up the mess caused by the incident.
Only after the incident, according to Ilya, did the business owner suggest he fill out the paperwork.
— He said, “Let’s go—we need to sign a couple of documents.” I was completely in shock at the time. I don’t remember exactly if it was the day of the accident or the next day, but I wrote a job application as he dictated it to me.
In the employment application, he listed the date as August 28, even though the paint incident happened on the 29th.
— My hands were shaking; I had no idea what to do. I was just a young guy, facing a situation like that for the first time in my life. I was just in shock.
Later in court, it turned out that Ilya’s signature was also on the full financial liability agreement—an expert examination confirmed its authenticity, even though the young man couldn’t remember how he’d put it there.
According to the documents, on September 2, Ilya resigned, having officially worked there for only a couple of days. But the story didn’t end there.
Who should pay for the paint: Ilya or the sole proprietor?
As it turned out later, the Bobruisk road maintenance department repaired the asphalt and billed the sole proprietor, who later reimbursed them 6,264 rubles. In addition, the entrepreneur received a claim from the distributor whose paint he was supposed to transport—and some of which ended up on the road—resulting in the sole proprietor paying an additional 1,649 rubles. As a result, the entrepreneur asked the court to order Ilya to pay nearly 7,500 rubles in compensation. Meanwhile, Ilya filed a counterclaim seeking to have the full financial liability agreement declared invalid.
The court noted that the sole proprietor had not entered into an employment contract with Ilya and rejected the young man’s claim that he had not actually worked for the entrepreneur. Ilya also tried to prove that he should not be held liable for the damages due to improper documentation, and claimed that the documents regarding his hiring only appeared after August 29. However, he failed to convince the court of this; the court ruled that the damage was caused by the employee and that he must compensate for it.
As a result, the court set the amount of compensation for the damage at 6,000; an additional nearly 3,300 had to be paid for attorney’s fees.
Ilya disagreed with this decision. It turned out that the district prosecutor’s office had also filed an appeal. The court found it proven that Ilya was an employee of the sole proprietor, and therefore their relationship was subject to labor law provisions; the prosecutor’s office disagreed with this.
According to the case file, there was no written employment contract between them, and the sole proprietor’s representative stated in court that he worked alone. Furthermore, no local regulations, time sheets, or payroll documents were found at the business that would confirm the existence of hired employees.
The prosecutor’s office pointed out that Ilya had already stated in court that he had written his job application the very next day after the incident. According to the prosecutor’s office, the court did not consider this argument and did not evaluate it. Consequently, if there was no employment relationship between the parties, the provisions of the Labor Code regarding an employee’s financial liability cannot be applied to Ilya.
“I owe a huge sum, while the sole proprietor owes just 2 base units”
The prosecutor’s office requested that the decision be overturned with regard to the recovery of damages, but the judicial panel disagreed. It concluded that Ilya had, in fact, begun working as a driver even before his employment was properly formalized. The mere fact that the employment documents were drawn up later or improperly does not mean that an employment relationship did not exist.
The court’s ruling specifically noted: “The actual admission of an employee to work by an authorized official of the employer marks the commencement of the employment contract, regardless of whether the hiring was properly documented.”
Therefore, the arguments presented by Ilya and the prosecutor’s office did not provide the court with grounds to overturn the decision. The appellate court amended only the portion related to court costs: the amount Ilya was required to pay was recalculated and reduced to 2,244.2 rubles, and an additional 300 rubles were collected as state filing fees.
Ilya attempted to appeal the decision further, but the case was not referred to the court of cassation. The absence of an employment contract, violations during the hiring process, and the lack of a probationary period—none of these were considered sufficient grounds to exempt the young man from financial liability. Ilya was also unable to prove that he was not an employee of the sole proprietor.
He appealed to the regional prosecutor’s office, but they found no grounds to challenge the courts’ decisions.
At the same time, the courts noted violations on the part of the sole proprietor as well—specifically, regarding Ilya’s hiring. According to Ilya, he filed complaints with government agencies and learned that the business owner had been fined. However, he said the fine was small.
“It turns out I owe a huge amount, but the sole proprietor was only fined 2 base units.”
For Ilya, this story is essentially over now: the writ of execution was served at his workplace, and they’ve started deducting the money from his paycheck. The deductions continued for about five months; now, approximately 1,000 rubles remain. Nevertheless, Ilya gathered all his arguments once again and filed a supervisory appeal with the Supreme Court.
“Before this incident with the paint, I worked for a month without a day off, traveling wherever the sole proprietor sent me, working as a loader, and assembling furniture. I worked for peanuts, and in the end, I even ruined my back.”
Now Ilya says that if he could do it over today, he’d act differently and wouldn’t have signed the employment documents. But at the time, he simply didn’t understand what was going on.
“I was totally shaken up back then—it was incredibly stressful: spilled paint, and I had to clean up that mess. And at first he’d say, ‘Everything’s fine, everything’s okay,’ trying to cheer me up. And then—“Let’s go; we need to sign a couple of documents.”
Now I would definitely consult with my loved ones and wouldn’t sign any papers.
I was young, foolish, and inexperienced. I was looking for a job that paid well; I wanted things to be more or less okay so I could get on my feet. I just didn’t realize that something like this could happen.
When an employee is required to compensate for damages
As explained by attorney Tatyana Revinskaya, damage to an employer’s property does not always automatically mean that the employee is required to compensate for the resulting damages.
According to Part 1 of Article 400 of the Labor Code, an employee can be held financially liable only if all four of the following conditions are met:
Actual damage. The employer’s property must have been damaged or lost specifically while the employee was performing their job duties.
Unlawful conduct. The employee’s actions or inactions must violate established rules (legislation, internal work regulations, job descriptions, or the employment contract).
Fault of the employee. It must be proven that the damage was caused intentionally or due to the employee’s negligence or carelessness.
Causal link. The employer must prove that the property was damaged specifically as a result of the employee’s unlawful conduct and not due to external factors.
Who bears the burden of proof?
As a general rule (Article 400, Part 4 of the Labor Code), the burden of proving the fault of a specific employee rests with the employer. The employer must conduct an investigation and gather the relevant evidence on its own.
— However, there are exceptions to this rule. The burden of proof shifts to the employee if an agreement on full financial liability (individual or collective) has been concluded with the employee; the employee also bears full financial liability on other grounds provided for in Article 404 of the Labor Code (for example, if the employee received valuables under a one-time power of attorney; the damage was caused by a shortage, intentional destruction, or intentional damage to products (goods, cargo) issued to the employee),— explains Tatyana Revinskaya.
In accordance with Part 1 of Article 401 of the Labor Code, an employee who admits guilt has the right to compensate for the damage in full or in part on a voluntary basis. This allows for the avoidance of litigation costs.
If an agreement cannot be reached, the employer may recover the damages by compulsory means: by deducting the amount from the employee’s salary. However, the law sets certain limits:
Amount limit: An employer may, by decision, require an employee to pay damages only if the amount does not exceed three times the employee’s average monthly earnings (Article 408, Part 1 of the Labor Code).
Payment limit: each time wages are paid in cash, the amount withheld (and, if there are other deductions, such as child support or court-ordered payments, their total amount) may not exceed 50% of the wages due (Article 107, Part 2, Paragraph 3, and Article 108, Part 2, of the Labor Code). If the amount of the debt is larger, the employer must withhold it in installments over several months.
The law establishes a strict procedure and deadlines for the employer (Parts 2 and 3 of Article 408 of the Labor Code):
Request an explanation: Before issuing a withholding order, the employer must obtain a written explanation from the employee.
The order must be issued no later than 2 weeks from the date the damage was discovered. Failure to meet this deadline deprives the employer of the right to make an uncontested deduction.
The order may be forwarded to the accounting department no earlier than 10 days after the employee has reviewed it and signed for receipt.
Recovery of damages is transferred exclusively to the judicial process in two cases: the employer missed the two-week deadline for issuing the deduction order, or the amount of damage caused exceeds three times the employee’s average monthly earnings.
If an employee categorically disagrees with the very fact of the deduction or its amount, they have the right to challenge the employer’s order in accordance with the procedure provided by law (Article 408, Part 4 of the Labor Code).
If the employer disregarded the rules and deducted the money in violation of the established procedure (for example, without a written explanation, without an order, or retroactively), the employee should contact the body responsible for resolving labor disputes—the Labor Disputes Commission (LDC) or a court. Upon the employee’s complaint, this body will issue a decision ordering the immediate return of the entire amount unlawfully withheld.