Unlock eSignature Legitimacy for Employee Performance Review in Canada

How to eSign a document: e-signature legitimacy for Employee Performance Review in Canada

[Music] [Music] thank you well hello there and welcome again to the employment law show so good to have here for the next 30 minutes I guarantee you'll learn a lot just stay tuned and feel free to contribute anytime how do you do that you can always Reach Out by email to Leora and his team John scholes here lior samfier there as well help at employment lawyer.ca phone Call's always good right 1-855-821-5900 and the website built just for you to learn and reach out again and have access to what we call the severance calculator pocket employment lawyer.ca it's free it's Anonymous and it was built just for you so feel free to use that anytime you would like performance review for employees that's going to be the main topic in just a bit that will give you some phone calls from our radio shows across the country some emails and so much more so let's get cooking we always start lior with the week that was what do you got pal hey John great to be here employment law is the topic of the day well it's the topic on every show but it's because it's a large topic it's a topic that we all are affected by it if you have a job then guess what employment law is so relevant to you it impacts so much of what you do if you think about it you're probably spending more time working than you're doing other things more time than you're spending with your family more time than you're spending doing your hobbies that's why employment law is so important it impacts probably the biggest thing though or the thing at least the thing that we spend the most time doing and so many people don't know what their rights are they have questions or when a problem arises they may assume that there's no options that the law is not really on their side well I'm here to tell you that yeah the law is on your side and if you know how the law operates and you understand your rights you'll be better informed better educated and you're not going to be concerned when something bad happens because you'll know I know what to do I know what to say that is exactly what the show is all about now I can only talk about so many topics on the show so if you want to continue the discussion or if you have a question that we haven't covered or you want me to roll up my sleeves and get to work on your specific matter easy to do we'll give you contact information throughout the show you can reach out to myself and my team across Canada and we'll make sure that you're taken care of but let's talk about the situation that came across my desk and I'm actually cheating here it's a situation that you told me about but I found it to be so interesting that I think it's worth talking about on on the show right now so you told me about a friend of yours that works in a gym unfortunately he was in a car accident he was supposed to work the night shift that night and he was pretty banged up and wasn't able to to work his shift that night called his employer the owner of the gym said I'm not going to be able to to come in tonight I'm in really rough shape big car accident and police said no no well you have to there's no one else you better come in a person says I can't employer says you have to so employee says okay well then I quit too bad I'm not coming anymore goodbye and the question became of course well what happened here who was in the right who was in the wrong well let's let's break this down here first of all his employer did not have the ability to insist that he come in if he has a serious and and a real legitimate medical issue well his employer has to figure out a way to accommodate that yes part of being a business owner is you have to deal with those difficult situations or last minute you don't have an employee it just comes with the territory so you can be penalized if your second can come into work you can't be penalized because you have a medical condition that's the employer's issue there's no no such thing as telling you no no don't uh uh don't do what your doctor says ignore your medical condition can't do that so what your friend should have done your friend should have said well sorry can't do it I'll be back when I can not resign that was the mistake that your friend made resigning here is not the right approach because if you resign you've walked away from your rights there's nothing else owed to you there was no need for that now I understand your friend probably thought well I have no choice because my employer is telling me that I have to come in well there is a choice and the choice is no I am not coming in and I'll see you when I'm cleared by resigning now your friend has not owed anything so don't ever do that so the lesson here is also this never resign unless you've decided you don't want to work there anymore never resign because you feel like this person did that there's no other option there's always another option and that option is no I'm going to do what my doctor tells me or I'm going to come into work when I'm able to don't resign unless you want to that's just simply a way to walk away from your rights and you don't want to do that you know it's interesting in this case I guess every case when there's an injury of this type or you're sick or you're off work it's we always talk about your your doctor your medical team is the gatekeeper of your health and they have the final say when it comes to being able to work or not in this particular case it may have been yeah he was in a car accident that night he was you know black and blue he wouldn't have a chance to get to his doctor maybe for a few days or a few weeks maybe that's why he panicked I can't provide that note right now can he still say when I get to my doctor I will provide you the note and legitimize what I'm saying I can't work you have a reasonable period of time to get to your doctor you everyone knows you can't just go to the doctor today if you're sick today or something happened today it may take a few days and maybe even longer depending on where you live and who your doctor is so that's absolutely fine that's why his employer should have allowed him to to be off and if at some point he couldn't corroborate his absence by getting something from a doctor at some point well then there may be an issue but it's absolutely fine to say I can't come into work for medical reasons I would give you a doctor's note as soon as I can and the employer frankly can't do anything about that and I didn't go as far as to tell him what his Severance might have been because I kind of know during the show so long for you but he'd only been there for a few months I think he would have been shocked what you're going to tell us he could have possibly gone from Severance yeah so even after a few months of employment that's a very good point he's going to be out a few months Severance it could be three it could be four it could be six months of severance even after a few months so it's not like he walked away from one week's pay that Severance is calculated in the months very important for you to remember as well even if you work for a company for a short period of time two months six months a year you're still owed substantial amount of severance Severance that's calculated in months not weeks don't believe me check out our seventh calculator again it's pocketemployment lawyer.ca lior is correct that is one great way to reach out you can always use a phone call as well one eight five five eight two one 50 900 help at employment employment lawyer.ca is a way to do that too but we have a radio show we have several radio shows across the country for the last 10 years we've been doing that you always phone in you have wonderful questions we play them back on the show we talk about them again it's a learning opportunity so the first phone call the or for today's show from the radio show is coming up right now coming on behalf of my father he's 74 years old and he's been working basically a termination letter and told to go home they eventually got him to come back but they gave him a lower position he was put in just the warehouse earlier this year he was given another letter but this time giving him six months notice well okay I mean there's a lot of things here to break down and you know I could do a whole show just on this call to be honest with you number one that initial layoff was a termination the company didn't have a right to put you could you put them on that temporary lab so he didn't even have to come back he could have treated it as a termination and gotten his Severance then now when they brought him back of course that demotion lower position that's a constructive dismissal that doesn't that doesn't allow a company is not allowed to do that he could again treat that as a termination and get Severance of course there's the overarching issue are they picking on him because he's 74 years old he's older and is that why they're doing that that could be age discrimination so any way you slice it this person is entitled to Severance and listen after all these years and at the age of 74 that's going to be a substantial amount so we know he's owed Severance let's see how much Severance we're gonna go of course as I said before the pocketemployment lawyer.ca your cr7's calculator tool we're going to use use it right now our seventh calculator and let's see how much Severance he is owed so 17 years have been there a long time 74 years of age it's going to be difficult for him to find another job you can see on that screen that he's owed as much as 22 months of severance 22 months so what the company did here is not legal that's why he has those Severance entitlements and you know I mentioned our Severance calculator important to also say of course it's free it's Anonymous it's strictly there for your benefit there's no strings attached to it so always the first place you go to if you lost your job if you think you've been constructively dismissed if you're worried about losing your job just go to pocketemployment lawyer.ca best thing about this call is you always mention the different factors that are used to calculate Severance and the the overbearing one of this is like you just mentioned 74 years old people think that's a lot of severance he's getting but I have friends that are that are our age and they're in their 40s early 50s they're having trouble competing with 25 year olds never mind a guy who's 74. there's no way this guy's going to get a job within two months it's just not going to happen against the inflated Severance the inflated Severance that's why one of the three biggest factors is your age and the law assumes right or wrong and I think correctly that the longer the the it's going to take you longer to find the job the older you are the more Severance for those reasons it's not fair to expect a 74 year old to take as long as a 24 year old that's why we have these significant servants entitlements which of course can be as much as two years not temporary layoff the first time he was on there we said it was a termination we know that are you still seeing I mean covet's still active but we're kind of in the wake of it now are you still seeing people on layoffs from that time I I actually am I'm still getting calls from people saying I've been on lab since March or April of 2020. wow okay that's a long time and when is enough enough and I say well wait a second it was enough in 2020 when you were put on that layoff you could have said that's a termination of employment you didn't have to wait and now three years later almost now no no way is that legal you can treat that as a termination you can decide noun frankly you should decide now I've had enough I want my Severance and I want to move on another way to reach out terminationquestions.com that again that's free for you to use anytime terminationquestions.com first one from it today is after a recent storm I was late coming into work my employer advised me that my pay will be deducted if this happens again and I'm in danger of losing my job for cause I've never been late before and I'm an efficient and productive employee what can I do so let's start with it from the perspective of the employer first and we'll talk about it from the perspective of the employee an employer does have the the right to expect that an employee show up to work on time even if it's bad weather ultimately it is the employee's responsibility to account for that and to take their time and leave early to be at work on time even again if it's bad bad weather but the question is what happens if despite that the employee is not on time maybe they didn't plan ingly maybe they didn't realize it was that bad they didn't leave the house on time so they're late can they just be punished for that well no not so fast this employer is saying well we're going to let you go for cause if it happens again yeah I know it's going to take more than that you would need several incidents like that where the employee was warned in advance clearly they don't care clearly they're not getting it then and maybe only then can the company consider a termination for cause and that's because it's very difficult to let someone go for cause it's extremely difficult it's reserved for the worst offenders and being late is just not going to do it unless it's such a consistent thing and and they've tried to correct the behavior and they failed so I wouldn't be too worried about that situation you're not going to be fired for cause because you missed work or you were late to work because of bad weather you should be at work on time I'm not saying otherwise but the fact that maybe you didn't do what you were supposed to does not mean you can be fired for cause all right guys we'll take a short break as mentioned our main topic for today is performance reviews for employees we'll get to that on the other side of the break in the meantime one eight five five eight two one fifty nine hundred to reach out to Leo and his team help employment lawyer.ca as well we're coming right back stick around people think contractors aren't owed Severance employment lawyer.ca says that is a myth many contractors are actually employees and are entitled to full severance pay always check with the employment lawyer first at employment lawyer.ca how do you force insurance companies to pay long-term disability claims insurance companies deny legitimate claims all the time they're playing the odds they know that most people are just going to walk away your insurer May ignore you they may even ignore your doctors but they can't ignore us we know how insurance companies work we know their weaknesses we know how to use the legal process to force them to pay you what you owed go to disabilityrights.ca discover your rights fight back and get what you're owed people think you are only owed two weeks pay when you lose your job employment lawyer.ca says that is a myth you may be owed much more than two weeks per year don't settle for less always check with the employment lawyer first that employment lawyer.ca foreign [Music] welcome back thanks for hanging around employment law show every week you can reach out anytime not just once a week to leor1855-821-5900 that is the number feel free to call with your own questions and concerns have a length of your chat with one of leora's Team you can also email help employment lawyer.ca okay let's get into our main topic for today or performance review primer for employees number one an employee is within their right to critique and review an employee's performance and conduct yep listen we talked before the break about the fact that an employer can expect an employee to be on time but an employer can expect a certain level of performance from their employees and they're allowed to monitor that performance and they're allowed to critique that performance and even engage in discipline when that's needed so an employer that does that is not overstepping necessarily an employer can certainly do that and you know a good employer in fact stays on top of those things make sure that the employees are doing their job make sure that policies are being followed and of course deals with situations with the employees not doing what they're supposed to a bad employer is the one that just ignores things and looks the other way that's just an invitation for proms down the road but it has to be legitimate you know we're we're seeing and I've certainly seen situations where an employer goes overboard and is is too involved and it's not doing it for good faith and is really trying to push employees to leave and and trying to make the work situation uncomfortable to the point that it becomes bullying and harassment that is not appropriate you can't over stretch and you can't go overboard if it's legitimate done in good faith fine if it's in bad faith if it crosses the line over into bullying and harassment not legal at all and there are absolutely legal repercussions for doing that performance reviews Point number two is this if an employee does not agree with a performance review they can and should Voice or disagreement but in writing absolutely and then you know you've said exactly the key here it has to be in writing if your employer puts you in a performance uh review a negative review and you just put your head down because you're not happy and you continue working it's the same thing as if you've just accepted this the same thing that as if you had said I agree this is 100 correct no problem employer the reason why you don't want to do that because a negative performance review oftentimes is a step towards a termination for cause what the company may be trying to do is build up a case and say well we gave them a bad performance review it didn't improve the performance he accepted it now we're just going to let him go for cause we don't have to pay any Severance it is a way a company often tries to do that to get to the point when they terminate you for cause so how do you combat that how do you avoid that situation altogether very simply as John said you respond you don't just accept it you say I don't agree with this or here's the information that's missing or here's a different perspective employee that you need to have of course you're not going to be rude about it you're not going to be disrespectful that's never a good idea but if you do it professionally and respectfully email works great by doing that you're protecting yourself by doing that you're not going to be considered to have accepted what your employer did and you're going to make it that much more difficult for the company to terminate you for cause so if it's not something that you agree with say so if it's a hundred percent accurate and if you agree with it completely okay do your best to move on but if you don't agree with it say so number three maybe a little bit of a shock for a smaller employers that just aren't Savvy when it comes to this stuff and that is employers can't change an employee's pay duties or job title because of a bad performance review exactly so an employer may say well we don't think you're doing such a good job in position a so we're just going to put you in position B and guess what position B comes with the pay decrease or different hours maybe a relocation can't do that and by the way they can't do that even if they're right that the performance is not great in the in the first job why because we still have laws dealing with constructive dismissal and then if an employer makes a significant change to the terms of employment such as a demotion such as a big pay raise you can treat that as a termination of employment what the employer should be doing if you're not doing a particularly good job in your original job is work with you on improving it you know give you the tools that you need give you the support that you need or maybe discipline you if it's warranted but they can't just say well we've taken it upon ourselves to change your job so the job that you used to have is very different from the job that you have now anytime the company does that even if it's for performance reasons this concept of constructive dismissals should come to mind that would allow you potentially to leave and get Severance but I want to leave you with this thought on on this point and that is I don't want anyone to say well I know it's a constructive dismissal so I'm packing up and leaving today no one leaves no one does that until you speak to me first right because we need to do it right we need to make sure that it is in fact a constructive dismissal but if you have a constructive dismissal those are the remedies and the options that are available to you again focusing on performance reviews this particular show guys and this final point is where a lot of employers do trip up I know that's for sure that is employers often incorrectly use that bad performance review to justify firing somebody for cause for cause this time yeah so this is where we need to again address the idea of a termination for cause and the fact that it's extremely difficult to terminate employment for cause it's not enough to show that your performance maybe wasn't that at the level that they wanted you to uh for it to be it's not enough to show that maybe you made a mistake at work to terminate you for cause you would have had to do something so bad so extreme that it's just not possible to continue employing you and John in my experience most of the time we're not even talking anywhere near that when the company terminates supposedly for cause yeah maybe the employee did something wrong but it's not bad enough and that's especially true if your your issue here is a performance issue because it's the company's responsibility and legal obligation to try to improve that performance so the question always becomes what support did you give the employee did you give them a warning did you give them a final warning did they know that they could lose their job and if you did all those things and you you built the case and there were several warnings and the performance legitimately wasn't good and it wasn't getting getting better maybe then you can consider a termination for cost but unfortunately most employers don't want to work that hard and they don't build up their case that's when we have wrongful dismissal so if your performance Is Not Great your employer lets you go because of it you want to call me right away and that number again 1-855-821-5900 website employment lawyer.save that is also where you go to find a radio show that carries our radio program and from one of those programs our phone call number two for the day is coming up right now I've been with company for over 25 years purchase the owners sold they've asked me to stick around I've been working with them for almost nine months now from the beginning they pressured me they wanted me to sign an employment agreement I just didn't think really needed to not much has changed the other day he says well we're going to give you a car but we want you to sign an employment agreement to get the car I've seen that big flashing red light well yeah in a previous show we talked about employment law red flags and one of the big ones I mean the flashing lights was your employer just wants you to sign a new employment agreement that is bad news it's always bad news and it may be sound tempting well I want the company car so I'm going to sign that employment agreement well what happens when you find out that that employment agreement also is going to cost you at some point a hundred thousand dollars in Severance and it's going to give the company the right to put you on a temporary layoff and it's going to give the company the right to demote you and reduce your pay all of a sudden getting the company card doesn't seem as important and that's what an employment agreement does if your employer wants you to sign a new employment agreement there's a reason for it and it's not to make things better for you if they want to make things better they'll just do it they don't need you to sign an employment agreement they want you to sign an employment agreement because it's better for the employer it's going to save the employer money it's going to give them rights they don't otherwise have so don't agree to that if you've been asked to sign an employment agreement be concerned it is a big deal okay give me a call or send me a copy let me read it let me tell you what it says and let's understand what you've been asked to sign before you sign it not after pretty tempting though car's pretty sweet I mean it's better than the Dell gray for three dollars in a cassia there's no temptation there at all right no no uh it's still probably not worth it though that's right we'll take a short break into another phone call on the other side in the meantime the number 1-855-821-5900 and help employment lawyer.ca more coming up stick around people think you have to sign back a severance offer by a deadline employment lawyer.ca says that is a myth deadlines are used as a pressure tactic make sure the offer is fair before you sign always check with the employment lawyer first at employment lawyer.ca can insurance companies deny long-term disability claims for mental illness when you're suffering from a mental health disability insurance companies just don't understand but we do they can absolutely not force you back to work if your doctors say you are not ready and you know you're not ready they cannot make you go back to work if you have a mental health disability and your claim is denied don't give up give us a call and let us fight for you go to disabilityrights.ca discover your rights fight back and get what you're owed people think you aren't owed severance pay if you are fired for a reason employment lawyer.ca says that is a myth most for cause terminations are false and you are still owed full Severance always check with the employment lawyer first at employment lawyer.ca foreign [Music] welcome back thanks for sticking around after the show and anytime you can reach out to 1-855-821-5900 and help at employment lawyer.ca also the website pocketemployment lawyer.ca is there for you to learn so much about what we talk about on the show even before that phone call and you'll have access to the severance calculator as well phone call number three from one of our many radio shows is coming up right now let's get to it a little while back I was working out at the plant it was coming up to Christmas and then layoffs were coming around and then I got offered to go cover the co-ops as a foreman and then last minute they pulled the pin on that and they said I wasn't qualified and they gave the position to someone else I got terminated and how long did you work there for six months what did they pay you or did they pay you anything by way of severance no they didn't well you know why would an employer do that you know you have an employee and you're gonna dangle a carrot and they're getting excited another position oh no no that's not happening instead you're gone not a not a nice thing to do I think a good employer is not going to do that but the question for this show is not whether this employer is nice the question is whether or not what this employer did is legal and the termination itself unfair as it was it is legal why we know this by now that an employer generally has the right to let an employee go pretty much for any reason as long as Severance is paid so the the act of letting this person go even in these circumstances where he was promised something never happened instead he was let go even in these circumstances the termination itself is not illegal it is a legal termination but Severance has to be paid this person said after six months he didn't get any Severance and maybe that company thought well he only worked there for a few months why would we have to pay him something or maybe he worked in construction we hear all the time that employers believe in construction you don't pay Severance wrong you absolutely we get Severance in construction as well so the question then becomes well okay you've convinced us leor he gets Severance well how much Severance is it a week is it something else let's go to pocketemployment lawyer.ca one more time let's use our Severance calculator tool something that you can do at home yourself and let's find out how much Severance this person gets after six months when he got nothing so he's a four man six months on the job he got no severance but you see there he goes he gets anywhere from three to six months of severance not a week not two weeks not even three John instead three to six months that's how much he gets and by the way short service employees we know that get this treated disproportionately better when it comes to Severance same with you at home if you lost your job after three months after six months after 30 years doesn't matter go to pocketemployment lawyer.ca and use our sevens calculator I want to mention as well in addition to of course this TV show and radio show lior hosts live streams on YouTube and Facebook and Linkedin you want to join in and be there at St lawyers at St lawyers to do that and from the live stream lior goes like this I worked for four years for my employer each year I received a very substantial bonus until the year I took maternity leave I was the only one of my colleagues who didn't get my bonus and it appears I may not get it again next year what should I do well obviously that's that's just wrong and you know we've talked about this before that even in this day and age when employers should know better we still are seeing and I'm seeing employers that are not treating employees properly coming back from maternity leave you can't be mistreated or treated differently because you took a maternity leave or or parental leave whether you're a father or a mother you cannot be treated differently and if that means well we're not paying you a bonus because of that or we're going to penalize you somehow not only is that a human rights violation it could be in employment standards act violation it can also be a constructive dismissal it's not legal so if you ever find yourself in a situation where something has happened because you took a parental leave your job change your compensation change you didn't get an amount that's owing to you you didn't get a pay raise that you were expected if anything like that happens red flag okay not legal there are things you can do and it starts by giving me a call 1-855-821-5900 by the way that number anytime use it reach out and talk to lior and his team get another email question here with her remaining minutes pal it's uh my company is looking to relocate the office from its current location the move will result in over an hour added to my commute I asked if a work from home position was possible but was denied do I have to accept this relocation so see that often especially by the way coming out of the pandemic employers sometimes have decided to resize their offices maybe they don't need as much space or they decided to move somewhere so very very important that we understand what that means this goes back to the idea that an employer doesn't have a right to make a significant change to the terms of employment so if they moved across the street that's not a significant change right if they move to a different Province obviously that's a massive change most situations are going to be somewhere in between which is why that hour is kind of that guideline if that change that the company is implementing if that move is going to change or commute by more than an hour or an hour or more just like this person we're in constructive dismissal territory if it's less than an hour probably not so if the move is going to affect you by more than an hour you then have a right you can or have an option I should say you can accept it and continue working and you're commuting the extra hour sure or you can treat that as a termination of employment and get your full Severance you can do that you have that option so it's not about the number of kilometers that the company has moved it's about how it impacts you and whether you have a car and whether you're older or younger all those are relevant factors that may cause this to be a constructive dismissal it's interesting you mentioned that so if it's two people working the same place they're supposed to go to a different place one person drives the only one that's three buses two Subways and a sled dog I mean that's going to be a completely different metric for them right they can say new that that's right and you know I've had cases before where someone uh their company is relocated they didn't go very far there's only you know a few kilometers down but because this person didn't drive it would take them forever to get there with public transportation that was a constructive dismissal so the distance where the company's relocating can be small but if it impacts you maybe it's because of traffic flows maybe because you don't have a car if that's how it impacts you absolutely constructive dismissal John can you take it out for a little Spin and then decide yeah you can always do that in writing writing tell your employer I'm going to try it and see how it impacts me and then you can make the decision but it has to be in writing all right good stuff again for another We Appreciate You contributing to the show with phone calls emails otherwise you can always reach out to liorn now that we're done anytime 1-855-821-5900 help at employment lawyer.c there's that email address and again that website oh so important keep it on your phone bookmark it pocketemployment lawyer.ca and you'll have access free and Anonymous to the severance calculator as well and we'll catch you next time right here on the employment live show [Music]