‘Please Call Me’: A Turning Point for Labour Law

The Con­sti­tu­tional Court’s “Please Call Me” judg­ment has been a turn­ing point for South African review applic­a­tions and employ­ment law.

The pro­trac­ted legal battle between Voda­com and the inventor of “Please Call Me” (Voda­com (Pty) Ltd v Makate and Another [2025] ZACC 13) has taken another dra­matic turn, fol­low­ing a recent Con­sti­tu­tional Court decision that not only reshapes the dis­pute but also sets new stand­ards for judi­cial and arbit­ral review in South African law.

In 2001, a Voda­com trainee account­ant con­ceived the “Please Call Me” (PCM) ser­vice, enabling users without air­time to send a free mes­sage request­ing a call back. Voda­com adop­ted the idea, which became a com­mer­cial suc­cess. Years later, a dis­pute arose over whether the employee should be com­pensated for his innov­a­tion.

In 2016, the Con­sti­tu­tional Court ordered Voda­com and the employee to nego­ti­ate “reas­on­able com­pens­a­tion” in good faith. If nego­ti­ations failed, Voda­com’s CEO would determ­ine the amount. Nego­ti­ations broke down: the employee sought over R20 bil­lion, while Voda­com offered R10 mil­lion. The CEO ulti­mately awar­ded R47 mil­lion.

The review applic­a­tion

Dis­sat­is­fied, the employee launched a review applic­a­tion. The High Court set aside the CEO’S decision, remit­ting the mat­ter for recal­cu­la­tion with spe­cific guidelines. Voda­com appealed, but the Supreme Court of Appeal (SCA) dis­missed the appeal and, con­tro­ver­sially, sub­sti­tuted its own order—award­ing the employee bil­lions of rands based on his fin­an­cial mod­els, des­pite no cross­ap­peal seek­ing such relief.

Con­court find­ings

Voda­com then approached the Con­sti­tu­tional Court, arguing that the SCA’S judg­ment was fun­da­ment­ally flawed. The CC agreed, find­ing:

• Fail­ure to prop­erly con­sider the facts and issues: The SCA mis­un­der­stood or ignored cru­cial evid­ence, includ­ing fin­an­cial mod­els and expert testi­mony.

• Inad­equate reas­on­ing: The SCA’S judg­ment was riddled with con­tra­dic­tions and gaps, fail­ing to engage with the com­plex issues.

• Jur­is­dic­tional error: By sub­sti­tut­ing its own order without a cross-appeal, the SCA decided a case not prop­erly before it, viol­at­ing Voda­com’s right to a fair hear­ing.

These fail­ures breached the rule of law and the con­sti­tu­tional right to a fair hear­ing (sec­tion 34).

Out­come and sig­ni­fic­ance

The Con­sti­tu­tional Court gran­ted © Puzzles by Pap­po­com Voda­com leave to appeal and returned the mat­ter to the SCA for rehear­ing.

The court reaf­firmed that all adju­dic­at­ors, whether judges, CEOS, or CCMA com­mis­sion­er, carry a con­sti­tu­tional man­date to prop­erly con­sider the mater­ial issues before them. A fail­ure to do so amounts to a gross irreg­u­lar­ity.

Com­mis­sion­ers and decision­makers must now provide adequate reas­ons for their decisions.

The Voda­com judg­ment con­firms three routes to review CCMA awards:

• Sec­tion 145 (LRA): Gross irreg­u­lar­ity, such as fail­ure to con­sider mater­ial issues;

• Sec­tion 145 read with Sec­tion 34 (Con­sti­tu­tion): Where fair­ness is under­mined; and

• Dir­ect reli­ance on Sec­tion 34: Assert­ing a con­sti­tu­tional breach of the right to a fair hear­ing.

Cru­cially, pro­cess defects—such as inad­equate reas­on­ing or fail­ure to engage with mater­ial evid­ence—now jus­tify review and set­ting aside of awards, even if the out­come might have been reas­on­able.

Prac­tical impact

• The primary inquiry in review pro­ceed­ings is now whether the pro­cess was fair and whether the adju­dic­ator dis­charged the duty of proper con­sid­er­a­tion. The cent­ral­ity of the out­come of reas­on­able­ness is sig­ni­fic­antly reduced.

• For employ­ers and HR pro­fes­sion­als: The case is a cau­tion­ary tale about the risks of pro­trac­ted lit­ig­a­tion and the import­ance of clear, fair, and final dis­pute res­ol­u­tion mech­an­isms.

• For employ­ees: It reaf­firms the right to a fair hear­ing and mean­ing­ful engage­ment with their claims.

• For legal prac­ti­tion­ers: There is a renewed focus on both pro­cess and out­come.

The case is a land­mark in SA review law and employ­ment jur­is­pru­dence.

The Con­sti­tu­tional Court has elev­ated the duty of proper con­sid­er­a­tion and the require­ment for adequate reas­on­ing into con­sti­tu­tional imper­at­ives that bind both courts and CCMA com­mis­sion­ers.

As the legal saga con­tin­ues, this judg­ment will remain a touch­stone for fair­ness, account­ab­il­ity, and the rights of employ­ees to be heard and com­pensated for their con­tri­bu­tions.

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