Puerto Rico's Mediation and Adjudication Office (OMA)

A labor court that is not a court, and it is free

The Mediation and Adjudication Office (OMA) is the Labor Department's administrative forum where labor claims are resolved **without going to the Court of First Instance**. Its purpose, in the Department's own words, is **to ensure that non-unionized private-sector employees have a quasi-judicial forum** so their claims get a fair, fast and inexpensive resolution.

The fact that decides whether it is useful to you is in the statute: OMA has **jurisdiction concurrent with the Court of First Instance, *at the claimant's option*, in the matters within its jurisdiction**. That is, in those cases **you choose the forum**. It is not a mandatory step before court, nor a filter: it is an alternative.

What makes it practical for someone without money for litigation: the service is **free**, and parties **may appear pro se, including corporations, partnerships and other legal entities**. That last part is unusual: in court, a corporation normally needs a lawyer.

OMA was created by **Act No. 384 of September 17, 2004**, attached to the Labor Department, and today it lives in **Section 13 of the Department's Organic Act** (Act 15 of 1931, 3 L.P.R.A. § 320), where the list of cases and the procedure are set out.

What cases it takes (and three were added in 2026)

Section 13 enumerates the labor-management disputes the Office may conciliate and adjudicate. Read it as a closed list: if your claim does not fit one of these boxes, OMA is not your forum.

• **Reinstatement after a work accident**, violations of Article 5A of Act 45 of 1935, **where no damages are claimed**.
• **Wages, vacation and sick leave** under Act 180-1998. Here the Office also has **authority to impose the civil penalties** that statute provides in favor of the affected employee.
• **Payment of wages** under Act No. 17 of 1931.
• **Unjust dismissal** under Act 80 of 1976, **in complaints that do not claim damages on additional and separate grounds** beyond the severance right and the compensation for the dismissal itself.
• **Christmas Bonus** under Act 148 of 1969.
• **Working hours** under Act 379 of 1948, overtime, day of rest, meal period.
• **Working mothers' leave**, Sec. 7 of Act No. 3 of 1942, where **no compensation, damages or penalties on separate grounds** are claimed beyond settlement, payment or grant of the leave.
• **Minimum wage shortfalls** under Act 47-2021, **added by Act 69-2026**.
• **Other disputes the Secretary of Labor designates by regulation**, provided the adjudication **does not involve an award of damages**, **added by Act 69-2026**.
• **Religious accommodation** under Article 2.19 of Act 4-2017, **added by Act 69-2026**.

The limit to check before choosing: damages

Notice the pattern in the list: in accident reinstatement, unjust dismissal, working mothers' leave and the new disputes in subsection (9), OMA's jurisdiction is conditioned on **no damages being claimed**. That is the forum's boundary, and it is written in four separate places in the same section.

Translated into a decision: if yours is about collecting what you are owed (wages, overtime, severance, bonus, vacation) OMA is designed for exactly that. If you are also claiming damages on separate grounds, the Office cannot adjudicate that piece of the case.

And since jurisdiction is **concurrent and at your option**, the choice is yours and it has consequences: choosing OMA means a free, summary procedure with short deadlines; choosing court keeps the damages door open. Decide it looking at the whole claim, not just the part that is easiest to prove.

One detail that is not decoration: in Act 180 cases the Office may **impose that statute's civil penalties in favor of the employee**. It is not merely mediating so you get paid the shortfall.

How the process runs: 20 days, and a decision in 60

The first deadline is the forum's, not yours. **Once the Office receives a complaint from the Labor Standards Bureau, it must summon the parties to a conciliation hearing or session to be held within the following twenty (20) days** of receiving the complaint. And **the parties shall be advised that they have the right to legal assistance and representation** at that session.

If mediation and conciliation **produce no satisfactory agreement**, those steps are concluded and the case **proceeds to adjudication before an Examining Officer or Administrative Judge**. Mediation does not consume your case: it is the first stage, not the only one.

Adjudication is governed by **Act No. 2 of 1961, the Summary Procedure for Labor Claims**, and by **Act 38-2017 (the Uniform Administrative Procedure Act)**, in whatever does not conflict with **summary disposition for failing to answer the complaint or failing to appear at the hearing**. That clause is what gives the procedure teeth: an employer who does not answer or does not show up can be ruled against summarily.

And there is a clock on the decision: once the hearing is held and the dispute submitted, **the Examining Officer or Administrative Judge must issue it within sixty (60) days** of submission.

Who will hear you and with what powers: Examining Officers or Administrative Judges **shall be people knowledgeable in the labor field, preferably lawyers**, with authority to **administer oaths, issue witness subpoenas, orders to produce documents and protective orders**, and to **authorize limited discovery**, consistent with the goal of fast and inexpensive proceedings.

What you say in mediation cannot be used later

This is the part that most reassures anyone afraid that speaking will cost them the case. The Labor Department defines mediation as a **non-adversarial, non-adjudicative** process in which a mediator acts as facilitator so the parties reach a mutually acceptable agreement, and describes it as **voluntary, confidential and privileged**.

The scope of the privilege is concrete: **information or documentation offered by the parties and the mediator's working file may not be required in judicial proceedings or in administrative adjudication proceedings, including OMA's own adjudication**. What was said in mediation does not travel into the administrative judge's record.

And it comes with a lock: **no party may disclose, in whole or in part, the information offered in mediation**, on pain of sanctions, **unless all involved parties consent in writing**.

Adjudication is the opposite, and the Department describes it as such: a proceeding where an **Administrative Judge determines rights, obligations or privileges**, with the right to timely notice of the complaint, to answer, to **cross-examine witnesses and examine the evidence against you**, to appear pro se or through counsel, to present evidence, to an impartial adjudicator, and to a decision based on the administrative record.

Capped fees, and what happens if the employer does not comply

If you hired a lawyer, this forum has its own fee rule and it is worth knowing before signing anything. **When the law applicable to the complaint does not provide for the claimant worker's attorney fees**, the **employer found in violation** is ordered to pay fees **in an amount no greater than twenty-five (25) percent of what the worker receives, or three hundred fifty (350) dollars, whichever is greater**. And the statute closes it: **those shall be the only fees authorized** for the worker's legal representation on that account.

Winning and not getting paid is the reasonable fear of anyone who claims. The law anticipated it: if an Office determination is **final and unappealable** and the affected party does not comply, **the Secretary, through counsel, may go to the Court of First Instance** to enforce the decision **as though it were a court judgment**, with **interest on amounts owed, attachment of property or contempt sanctions**.

And that enforcement does not wait in line: **the Court shall give these cases priority on its calendar and summon the parties to a hearing within no more than thirty (30) days** of the Secretary's petition.

Before filing, confirm two things with the Office: that your claim fits one of Section 13's boxes, and **which regulation it is being processed under today**. Subsection (9), new in 2026, lets the Secretary **add disputes by regulation**, so the list of cases can grow without the statute changing. OMA is located in the Prudencio Rivera Martínez Building in Hato Rey, and publishes its phone numbers and email (`oma@trabajo.pr.gov`) on the Department's page.