In wrongful dismissal situations, many employers provide dismissed employees with severance packages that consist of a salary continuation.  Of course employees would usually prefer to be paid a lump sum, but usually, they are just not entitled to a lump sum under Canadian law.  Dismissed employees are entitled to be paid the minimum amounts under the Ontario Employment Standards Act, 2000, which include termination and severance.  The rest of the damages that they are owed are paid “in lieu of” reasonable notice.  This means that dismissed employees are only entitled to the payments, strictly speaking, if they have not found other work.  If they do find work and they have not yet settled with their former employers, the employers are entitled to credit for any amounts earned by the former employee during the notice period.

Most employers (and employees) do not want to wait and see how long it might take to find other work.  They want things resolved and out of the way.  So employers will often provide a salary continuance arrangement that provides some incentive for the employee to look for work and find a new position.  Usually, it is 50% of the remaining severance amount that they might have been paid. This is considered a reasonable provision and many employers will refuse to delete these clauses.  Nevertheless, most employees view these incentive payments as a “clawback” on the amounts that they are “owed” and become very upset with these provisions.  Some employers simply are very insistent on including these provisions as part of any severance arrangement.

Nevertheless and with that in mind – here are a few things you can consider when faced with a salary continuance proposal:

1.  The Length of the Notice/Severance Period:  Just because an employer has chosen some arbitrary number as the number of weeks or months that it will provide as a notice and/or severance period, that number may not be written in stone.  It may be quite flexible.  Sometimes employers will low-ball employees, hoping that they do not take any further steps.  Employees are often more likely to get the notice period increased than to get the “clawback” removed.  Many employers will increase proposed severance packages after receiving a letter from legal counsel.

2. Definition of Mitigation:  Some employers will state that the 50% payout will be triggered if the employee finds any work – even part time, consulting or temporary.  Empoyers are often willing to negotiate changes to these clauses so that the 50% will only come into effect if the employee has found a reasonably comparable employment or self-employment opportunity.

3.  What’s Included?:  Sometimes employers will offer a salary continuation on the basis of base salary alone.  Employees are entitled to be provided with benefits continuation, pension contributions, bonuses and other amounts that they would have earned if they had continued to be employed – even the severance arrangement is a salary continuation package.

4.  Other Items:  Employees should be able to get some other items included in their severance packages – like outplacement assistance through a decent agency and reasonable legal fees to have a package reviewed.  As well, some employers will provide a helpful reference letter though they cannot really be forced to do so.

The items listed above are items that employers will often consider changing, adjusting or adding.

It is fair to point out that, despite anything I have said above, some employers will be open to removing the salary continuation provision and paying out a lump sum.  They will usually want some concession in exchange – for example a lower overall amount or the agreement not to pay some of the “extra items” listed above.  But it is often  worth trying.

Other employers will not budge on anything and will tell employees to take the package or bring a lawsuit.  Employees then have to make a decision as to whether it is worthwhile to start a legal claim.  This can be a difficult decision, especially since neither the employer, the dismissed employee or the lawyer know how long it might take the employee to find new employment.

Nevertheless, in situations where employers have provided low-ball offers and are not willing to budge initially, dismissed employees will often come out ahead by proceeding with a Statement of Claim (i.e. filing a lawsuit in court).