First Reference Talks

Is severance pay required when an employee is terminated?

Thursday, September 29th, 2011

When I speak at conferences, I am often asked the following question: “Is severance pay required when an employee is terminated?”

Before this question can be answered, we have to first confront the difficulty that some payroll terms traditionally used to describe both termination, as well as any payments resulting from this event, haven’t always been defined with the greatest of clarity. My preference has always been for those terms that convey the clearest meaning of the related employment standards and source deduction requirements.

Tags: constructive dismissal, death benefits, employment law, layoff, loss of employment, Notice, payments on separation, retiring allowance, separation payments, Severance pay, statutory notice, Statutory severance, termination, termination for cause, termination without cause, wages in lieu of notice, wrongful dismissal
Posted in Compensation, Employment Standards, Human Resources, Payroll | Make a Comment »

Written agreements in the employment relationship are valuable

Thursday, August 25th, 2011

I have written in this blog and elsewhere, of the value in written employment contracts, written offers of employment, and written employment policies. Much like the break up of a marriage, the parties to the dissolution of the employment relationship often have widely divergent recollections of the understanding of the terms of the relationship when they were entered into. In particular,…

Tags: constructive dismissal, employment contract, employment contracts, employment law, employment policies, employment relationship, hiring process, negligent misrepresentation, offers of employment, resignation, severance package, written agreements, wrongful dismissal
Posted in Employment Standards, Human Resources, Recruiting and Hiring | Make a Comment »

Employee’s options after constructive dismissal

Friday, April 15th, 2011

What does an employee do if she has been constructively dismissed but has not been told to leave her employ? Is she still entitled to continue to work for the employer and look for alternative employment? Is she obligated to do so?

Tags: 10% reduction in all compensation, alternative employment, constructive dismissal, Dismissal, duty to mitigate, employment law, Evans v. Teamsters Local No. 31, mitigate losses, obligation to mitigate damages, period of reasonable notice, Return to work, Russo v. Kerr Brothers Limited, Supreme Court of Canada decision, terms of employment, unilateral and substantial reduction in compensation, unilateral change in working conditions, wrongful dismissal
Posted in Employment Standards, Human Resources | Make a Comment »

Don’t push the employees – Court of Appeal deals with damages in a wrongful dismissal claim

Tuesday, September 7th, 2010

The scope of damages available in wrongful dismissal claims has been steadily widening over the past decade. However, in a decision of the Ontario Court of Appeal, released on May 28, 2010, the Court reversed this trend by rejecting tort liability of an employer for intentional infliction of mental suffering arising from a dismissal.

Tags: bad faith in the matter of the dismissal, constructive dismissal, damages, discipline, Dismissal, employer code of conduct, employment law, intentional infliction of mental suffering, Ontario Court of Appeal, performance review, personal liability on a manager, terminations, tort liability, tort of negligence in the employment context, torts of battery, vicarious liability, vicariously liable, wrongful dismissal, Wrongful dismissal claims
Posted in Employment Standards, Human Resources | Make a Comment »

Protection for pregnant women strengthened by Ontario and British Columbia courts

Tuesday, August 17th, 2010

In a decision released on July 19, 2010, the Human Rights Tribunal of Ontario held that an employee who was fired because she was pregnant had been discriminated against on a prohibited ground…

Tags: British Columbia, constructive dismissal, discrimination, discrimination based on sex, Dismissal, human rights code, human rights tribunal, maternity leave, ontario, pregnancy and the workplace, pregnancy leave, prohibited ground of discrimination, repudiation of the employment relationship, small claims court, termination
Posted in Employment Standards, Human Resources, Human Rights | Make a Comment »

Slaw.ca: Court limits liability for mental suffering

Wednesday, July 7th, 2010

In December 2008, the Ontario Superior Court of Justice awarded Marta Piresferreira, a former employee of Bell Mobility Inc., more than $500,000 in damages arising from an assault at the hands of her supervisor. The Court found the company and supervisor jointly liable for Piresferreira’s damages. Then in May of this year, the Court of Appeal reversed the lower court decision.

Tags: constructive dismissal, contract law, damages, emotional distress, employment contract, employment law, in the course of employment, law of tort, negligent infliction of mental suffering, ontario, Piresferreira v. Ayotte, termination, tort, wrongful dismissal
Posted in Employment Standards, Human Resources | Make a Comment »