JUSTICE MARTIN VILLARAMA, JR.: PAYMENT OF DOCKET AND OTHER FEES WITHIN THIS PERIOD IS MANDATORY FOR THE PERFECTION OF THE APPEAL. OTHERWISE, THE RIGHT TO APPEAL IS LOST. (Section 4, Rule 41 of the 1997 Rules of Civil Procedure, as amended).

This is so because a court acquires jurisdiction over the subject matter of the action only upon the payment of the correct amount of docket fees regardless of the actual date of filing of the case in court.  The payment of appellate docket fees is not a mere technicality of law or procedure.  It is an essential requirement, without which the decision or final order appealed from becomes final and executory as if no appeal was filed. The Supreme Court held in one case that the CA correctly dismissed the appeal where the docket fees were not paid in full within the prescribed period of fifteen (15) days but were paid forty-one (41) days late due to inadvertence, oversight, and pressure of work. (Guevarra v. Court of Appeals, No. L-43714, January 15, 1988, 157 SCRA 32. )  In another case, the High Court ruled that no appeal was perfected where half of the appellate docket fee was paid within the prescribed period, while the other half was tendered after the period within which payment should have been made. Evidently, where the appellate docket fee is not paid in full within the reglementary period, the decision of the trial court becomes final and no longer susceptible to an appeal.  For once a decision becomes final, the appellate court is without jurisdiction to entertain the appeal. x x x x With regard to petitioner’s plea for a liberal treatment of the rules in order to promote substantial justice, the Court finds the same to be without merit.  It is true that the rules may be relaxed for persuasive and weighty reasons to relieve a litigant from an injustice commensurate with his failure to comply with the prescribed procedures. However, it must be stressed that procedural rules are not to be belittled or dismissed simply because their non-observance may have prejudiced a party’s substantive rights. Like all rules, they are required to be followed except only for the most persuasive of reasons when they may be relaxed.  In this case, petitioner has not shown any reason such as fraud, accident, mistake, excusable negligence, or a similar supervening casualty which should justify the relaxation of the rules.  The explanation advanced by petitioner’s counsel that the failure to pay the appellate docket and other legal fees within the prescribed period was due to his extremely heavy workload and by excusable inadvertence did not convince the Supreme Court (D.M. Wenceslao and Associates, Inc. vs. City of Paranaque, G.R. No. 170728, August 31, 2011, VILLARAMA, JR., J.).