[Haley O’Halloran]

in reply to: Performance Software for Union Organization (120 employees) #94199

Hi there!

Here are a few articles you can check out that offer various options in different price ranges depending on your unique needs:
https://union.dev/blog/articleid/34/top-union-software-tools-for-unions
https://www.unionware.com/news-stories/best-union-software

Learn Which Labor Union Software Works Best For You

-HR Insider Staff

[Haley O’Halloran]

in reply to: Ontario Maternity Leave Employment Insurance Top Up #94210

Hi Sarah, thank you for your question!

Standard Ontario maternity leave pay should be 55% of earnings availed for up to 40 weeks, but one parent can’t receive more than 35 weeks of standard benefits. Extended parental benefits pay 33% of earnings.

In Ontario, your employee must give you at least two weeks’ written notice before beginning a their leave and, if you want to request it, they can be required to provide a certificate from a doctor, midwife, or nurse practitioner stating the baby’s due date so you know when her leave will end.

If you have more questions regarding maternity leave in Ontario, check out these articles to further your understanding:
Maternity Leave Game Plan
Maternity Leave Ask The Expert

-HR Insider Staff

[Haley O’Halloran]

in reply to: Overtime & Compensatory Travel #94103

Hello –

Yes, overtime in Quebec is 40 hours. I was referring to federal overtime hours and apologize for the confusion. So any time worked over 40 hours in your jurisdiction should be considered overtime and paid out accordingly.
Commute time to and from the airport is not considered compensable as the flight is the main form of transportation to the site – you only need to cover flight costs and accommodations, along with travel to and from the work site once the employee is in the area you need them to be in for the job.
If your employee spent the maximum amount of time they are allowed to work on a daily basis on travelling to the worksite and working onsite, then they would be working overtime travelling back home from the work site. Therefore, you would need to account their travel time HOME as overtime. Whether they are working within business hours or not, if it is written into their contract that they can work a maximum of 12 hours a day and any extra is overtime, then you must pay those hours as overtime – even if they are spent in the car and if they are “outside of working hours”. Working hours can vary wildly with temporary work and site work, so that shouldn’t be a huge factor unless you have written it into their contract.
Yes of course – here is the link as plain text so you can paste it easily into your browser: https://www.cnesst.gouv.qc.ca/sites/default/files/documents/labour-standards-quebec.pdf

You are asking great questions – let me know if you have any more and I hope we are helpful in this confusing landscape of temporary employment and overtime!

-HR Insider Staff

[Haley O’Halloran]

in reply to: Promotion/Job Changes – Employment Contracts #94054

Yes, you can. However, be weary. Your employee can accept the new position with conditions attached to it, but you will also need to provide transparency regarding whether their new offer will tack onto their total service time with the company overall since hired. If you are attempting to create a completely new job and reset the employee’s service time, the employee may seek legal action and sorting out their severance when the time comes can get complicated. It is best to avoid probationary periods in employment contracts for already established employees with good records, even if they are changing roles. That being said, there is no law against writing a probationary period into the new contract. Just make the employee aware of this condition and proceed with caution.

-HR Insider Staff

[Haley O’Halloran]

in reply to: unresponsive employee #93933

Hi there!

Firstly, let’s address your employee not providing a doctor’s note per their sick leave for an extended period of time now. Illness or injury leave is employee-initiated and you have respected this by granting the employee their sick leave. Since I am unsure how long this employee has been with your company, I will assume they have been there for a couple of years, meaning they are entitled to take up to 5 paid days and 3 unpaid days of sick leave per fiscal year. Since they have passed their allotted paid and unpaid sick leave days, they are now on an fully unpaid absence. If they are unwilling to provide a doctor’s note explaining why they have been absent (which they should have done as soon as they were capable of doing so), and if they or their emergency contacts will not respond to your messages during working hours, you are absolutely in the correct position to terminate their employment. However, you were inquiring whether you are in the right time frame to assume the employee has quit their job.

Your employee is participating in job abandonment, meaning the employee fails to report to work as required, exhibits an intention of not returning to work, and does not notify the employer of their intention to quit. Unfortunately, alleging job abandonment presents numerous challenges for employers, primarily due to the high burden of proof required and the potential legal ramifications of a wrongful dismissal claim. Fortunately, you have exercised due diligence by contacting the employee and their emergency contacts over the past two weeks.

BC law doesn’t specify a ‘reasonable’ period for unexplained absence before it’s seen as job abandonment. It depends on the circumstances and the employer’s ability to prove the employee’s intent to leave the job permanently. So, you can “assume” your employee has quit their job and go forward accordingly, but that could lead to legal ramifications. My best advice is to just terminate the employee. You are allowed to request a doctor’s note, but your employee is not legally obligated to supply you with one – meaning you should just accept that you will not get back the amount you paid this employee for their (assumed) 5 paid days of sick leave but you will save a lot of money by not having them on your payroll anymore – what they did was disrespectful to you and your business! Give them fair notice, cut them loose when that notice is up, and move on.

In BC, employers can write to an employee to let them know that their job will end by a certain date, but notice cannot *begin* if an employee is on vacation, on leave, or unavailable to work due to medical reasons, amongst other conditions. Their leave has ended, so it is currently voluntary and they are refusing to communicate with you. They won’t provide you with any information regarding their leave or a doctor’s note, so you don’t know if they are unavailable to work due to the extent of their medical condition(s).

To let go of this employee, your options are to:

-Give the employee 2 weeks of written working notice.
-Pay the employee for 2 weeks and let them go immediately, or
-Give the employee 1 week of working notice and 1 week of pay.

Since your employee is not working, I would give them 2 weeks of pay and let them go. Hopefully this never happens again!

-HR Insider Staff

[Haley O’Halloran]

in reply to: Vacation Time Question #93582

Hello there!

Unless you have an unlimited paid time off policy, the vacation time your employee has earned for a certain year or period must be taken within 10 months after completing that year. Therefore, if your employee does not use their vacation time within that 10 months, the proverbial slate is wiped clean and they cannot tack on their old vacation days onto this new work period.

As an employer, you also have the right to schedule a vacation for your employee and have that discussion with them to ensure those days are taken before they expire. It sounds like you have a very hardworking employee on your hands – which is amazing, but you also want to provide them with open communication about time off that they are entitled to. Vacation pay must only be payed out to the employee at the end of the year if it is before the 10 month period where their vacation time expires, and if they quit or are terminated. If they stay with the company, you do not need to pay anything out at the end of the year.

Instating ETO or UTO would mean rewriting your employee’s contract and would not be the best step in my opinion. It is up to your employee when they take their vacation days and how many of them they take – if they choose to not use them, that is their choice. The specificities of vacation pay can become convoluted, so I highly recommend checking out this article navigating vacation pay contract options and our vacation pay compliance game plan, as the answer to this question can also vary depending on the jurisdiction your are in. I hope this answer helps!

-HR Insider Staff

[Haley O’Halloran]

in reply to: creating one policy for a company that works in multiple provinces and states #93580

Hello! You should create policies that are specific to each jurisdiction, as laws and employment terms can vary from province to province, let alone province to state. Thankfully, HRInsider posts policies for all provinces when certain subjects are concerned, easily found through our search bar. It is always a best practice to ensure each employee is given documents and contracts that regard the jurisdiction wherein they live and work – their place of work is where their rights lie, and although it is a tedious task, you must respect that as an HR manager. Best of luck!

-HR Insider Staff

[Haley O’Halloran]

in reply to: Timesheets for Ontario Employees #93577

Hello! It sounds like you are tracking their billable working hours – whether it’s through having your employees clock in or through digital tracking. So long as you record and retain the dates and times your employees work in some form, you do not need to keep a timesheet or something similar. You just need to be aware of when and for how long your employees work, along with when they are taking time off or are working outside of full-time hours. Technically, a work schedule is a form of a timesheet, for example.

If your employee works outside of the typical 40 hour work week – especially on a consistent basis – both you and them can keep track of this overtime to ensure they are compensated accordingly. Otherwise, traditional digital logs or HR software that tracks who is going to be in the office and who is not on any given day suffices for tracking billable working time.

For audit purposes and to prevent time theft, I suggest you keep a record of overtime hours and who is working when. You don’t need to keep a strict timesheet, but it is handy to have a system in place for knowing how many vacation days an employee has in the bank, for example, by having something everyone can reference for timekeeping purposes (your HR manager will know some good programs to use, like Humi). However, legally you do not need to keep a “timesheet”.

When you don’t have a specific timesheet in place, you can suffer from some pitfalls – to avoid these, check out this article on HRInsider. So long as you follow those tips and track time in your own way, you should be perfectly fine. Thank you for your question!

-HR Insider Staff

[Haley O’Halloran]

in reply to: Changing Job Titles and Fresh Consideration #93393

Since you mentioned they will be receiving a different job description and job title, I would highly recommend presenting them with a new employment contract. Refer to this policy to know what you should include in your contract, and remember that the offer letter is a separate document from the contract itself!

-HR Insider Staff

[Haley O’Halloran]

in reply to: Safety for Remote Employees #93391

This is a great question. Many employers believe their remote workers do not require health and safety training because they will not be on-site, which is not true. There are potential risks in any home office space, but your job as an employer is to provide materials (reading, eLearning, and meetings) that help your remote workers identify risks that can come from working at home (such as ergonomic safety and eye strain) and ensure your job site is safe. Since their home is not your job site, you do not have to perform assessments.

However, health and safety still needs to be appropriately managed for employees who are working from home. In certain circumstances, injuries sustained at the employee’s home can be classified as workplace-related. In order to minimize the risk, your remote work policy should:

-Define where the workplace extends to and how the workplace extends into the employee’s home;
-Indicate when the employee is considered to be in the work environment and when they are not;
-Make it clear that breaks are time away from work; and
-Establish that the employee is expected to maintain a safe work area in their home in a manner similar to the office environment and free of safety hazards.

One of the most important health and safety questions that should be answered when working at home is who will be responsible for health and safety issues and worker’s compensation if the employee is injured. To avoid complications, there should be a written agreement between the employer and the employee clarifying these matters. Where possible, aim to maintain appropriate health and safety standards at home by checking in with your remote employees regularly.

Health and safety issues include:

-What parts of the house will be considered the ‘workplace’? Is the bathroom and/or kitchen included?
That employee must immediately report any incident or injury to their supervisor (just as they would at the office).
-How will incidents be investigated?

Of course, there will be significantly reduced health and safety supervision of employees that are working remotely. This further stresses the importance of regular communication between employers and employees to ensure that employees remain safe and healthy and that they continue to comply with the guidelines, practices and procedures implemented by the employer in respect of remote work.

-HR Insider Staff

[Haley O’Halloran]

in reply to: Changing Job Titles and Fresh Consideration #93389

Hi there! Yes, you should provide fresh consideration to this employee as you are presenting them with a new employment contract. Fresh consideration makes the new contract binding and enforceable. Thank you for your question!

-HR Insider Staff

[Haley O’Halloran]

in reply to: Internal Interviews with Employees on Leave #93385

Thank you for providing more information! In this case, you are fully within your rights to contact the employee with a short message inquiring when their leave will end. Let them know that you are only asking because of the interview process and do not intend to make the employee feel rushed or pressured to return before they are ready. Go ahead with the interview process as normal but set aside a spot for him so he has a fair chance at the position, especially if he takes his time when responding to your message. According to the OHRC, “Employers are entitled to contact employees on leave if it is reasonably required. For example, contact may be needed to assess the length of absence or to find out if there is a potential return to work date.” Be as kind as you were in asking these questions and I’m sure everything will go smoothly.

-HR Insider Staff

[Haley O’Halloran]

in reply to: Internal Interviews with Employees on Leave #93383

Hi there!

I think we will need a bit more information to answer this question. Is this person already employed by your organization or are they a new candidate? Which jurisdiction are you located in?

Additionally, the specifics of your employee’s mental health leave should be agreed upon by both the employee and the employer. If you require a time frame and a doctor’s note, that can be within your rights and will leave you without confusion in the future. Was this more of a one-sided conversation before the employee went on their leave?

-HR Insider Staff

[Haley O’Halloran]

in reply to: Cancelling casual employee shift #93350

Hi there! Two days is ample notice for a casual employee, especially considering the minimum time requirement usually falls between a few hours to one day for most jurisdictions. If they were a permanent full-time employee, you would need to give them at least 48 hours notice of their shift cancellation or else you would have to pay them for 3 hours of their scheduled shift. Since you gave them fair warning about the cancelled appointment and they are hired as a casual employee, you are not required to pay them for the shift unless there is something written in their contract that would expressly go against that policy. Thank you for your question!

-HR Insider Staff

[Haley O’Halloran]

in reply to: Embarrassment Cases/ Investigations In An interview #93031

Hi there! Since you asked the candidate a general question regarding conducting investigations, it sounds like she didn’t need to divulge as much information as she did. Sharing the results is somewhat concerning, but if she went out of her way to not mention any names or specific details that could put those involved in the case at risk of breaching their privacy, I do not think she has committed a breach of privacy. However, I would consider if you want to hire someone who is so willing to share such sensitive information and how that may impact your own company in the future.

We also need to understand the candidate’s perspective – she may have thought you wanted more information to prove the validity of her work experience, especially in regards to specifically conducting investigations. You may want to be more thoughtful with your questioning going forward and request that they not share any specific details or outcomes so you don’t find yourself in a sticky situation. Since I don’t know which jurisdiction your are writing from, which questions you asked during the interview, and the breadth of the details this candidate shared, you can also contact the previous employer (especially if they are listed as a reference on her resume/cover letter) and ask what their confidentiality agreement states to see if she was within her legal rights to share that information. It is always a good idea to check references and previous employers before hiring someone, especially if they speak negatively of a past employer or share information that may be deemed sensitive.

If you think this candidate is the right fit for the role and just had a brief lapse in judgement, check out our posts about employee privacy breaches to make her more aware of what information she is allowed to share and protect your own information and privacy in the future.

Thank you for your question and best of luck during the hiring process!

-HR Insider Staff

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