Canadian Employment Law Today

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GST #897176350 Published biweekly 22 times a year Subscription rate: $299 per year CUSTOMER SERVICE Tel: (416) 609-3800 (Toronto) (800) 387-5164 (outside Toronto) Fax: (416) 298-5082 (Toronto) (877) 750-9041 (outside Toronto) E-mail: Carswell.customerrelations @thomsonreuters.com Website: www.employmentlawtoday.com Thomson Reuters Canada Ltd. One Corporate Plaza 2075 Kennedy Road, Toronto, Ontario, Canada M1T 3V4 Director, Carswell Media: Karen Lorimer Publisher: John Hobel Managing Editor: Todd Humber Editor: Jeffrey R. Smith E-mail: Jeffrey.R.Smith@thomsonreuters.com ©2015 Thomson Reuters Canada Ltd. All rights reserved. Emplo y ment Law Today Canad ad a ian www.employmentlawtoday.com How would you handle this case? Read the facts and see if the judge agrees YOU MAKE THE CALL 8 Employee fails to heed warnings THIS INSTALMENT of You Make the Call involves an employee who made too many long-distance telephone calls at work. Donna Reid-Moncrieff e, 49, worked in the Mississauga, Ont., offi ce of the federal Department of Citizenship and Immigra- tion since 1988, fi rst as a clerk and eventu- ally as a citizenship offi cer. In April 2010 she was suspended for 25 days for "preferential treatment or confl ict of interest." Reid-Moncrieff e's manager met with her to set out the department's expectations, in- cluding that she must make "every reason- able eff ort" to contact her supervisor, fi rst by phone and then by voicemail, to report lateness or absence due to illness. Vacation leave was to be requested in advance. In January 2011, the department sent an e-mail to staff about the use of offi ce telephones. ere had been long distance charges on the offi ce telephone bill and ev- eryone was reminded that personal long- distance calls were off -limits. e department conducted a review of the offi ce telephone bills in August 2011 to see if the message had gotten across to staff . e review showed that in the past month, Reid-Moncrieff e had made 33 long- distance calls on her offi ce phone. No other employee had made one. When this was brought to her attention, Reid-Moncrieff e acknowledged that all but one of the calls were personal. Reid-Moncrieff e explained that she hadn't intended to violate the directive but she had a daughter in university and a sick aunt with whom she needed to stay in contact. She said she had told her manager about this and thought the manager had au- thorized her to make long-distance calls to those two people if needed. When she real- ized she was mistaken she off ered to pay for the calls — which totaled $6.90 — and gave her manager a cheque to cover the cost. She also apologized for her mistake. e regional director suspended Reid- Moncrieff e for 30 days since she had not accepted responsibility and expressed no remorse, as well for as the large number of calls. e suspension letter stated that it was her fi nal warning and further mis- conduct would result in termination of em- ployment. When Reid-Moncrieff e returned in early January 2012, she was given another memo- randum that indicated she must contact her supervisor by phone before the sched- uled start of her workday if she was sick and couldn't come in, as well as a reminder about long-distance calls. e memorandum concluded with the warning that "failure to adhere to the standards outlined above will result in disciplinary action up to and including termination." On Aug. 30, 2012, Reid-Moncrieff e com- pleted a leave request for the next afternoon, but didn't send it for approval until seven minutes after the supervisor had left for the day. She then left work early the next day without receiving authorization. e super- visor sent Reid Moncrieff e a note indicating her quitting time along with instructions to give such requests to another supervisor if she wasn't in the offi ce. On Sept. 12, Reid-Moncrieff e sent a leave request for the next day to her supervisor 20 minutes after the supervisor had left. She said the software system for such requests wasn't working, so it delayed the request. Without receiving offi cial authorization, Reid-Moncrieff e took the day off . On Sept. 16 around midnight, Reid-Mon- crieff e left a voice message for the supervi- sor saying she was ill and would not be at work the next day. She slept through the morning and the time when her supervisor would have been at work to receive a call. Senior management felt the unauthor- ized absences, coming so soon after her sus- pensions, demonstrated a failure to take re- sponsibility or follow the rules despite clear warnings. Her employment was terminated eff ective Oct. 11, 2012. YOU MAKE THE CALL Was there just cause for dismissal? OR Was the dismissal wrongful? IF YOU SAID there was just cause for dismissal, you're right. e adjudicator ac- knowledged Reid-Moncrieff e had explana- tions as to why she made the phone calls and why she had taken unauthorized leave — she claimed to have been mistaken on both — but these did not change the fact she had received several clear warnings and made her "mistakes" despite these warnings. e adjudicator found Reid-Moncrieff e could be seen to have made reasonable ef- fort to inform her supervisor of her sick leave on Sept. 17, as she left a voice message the previous night. Her explanation that she was asleep in the morning and missed her chance to speak to her supervisor live was plausible and reasonable, so discipline wasn't warranted for this absence. However, Reid-Moncrieff e's absence on Sept. 13 was a complete failure to follow the procedure outlined in her previous warn- ings and, coming in context of multiple pre- vious suspensions, provided just cause for dismissal. "According to the principle of progres- sive discipline, an employer is justifi ed in escalating the sanctions it imposes on an employee for successive disciplinary infrac- tions," said the adjudicator. "After the 30-day suspension in November 2011, the (employ- er) cannot be faulted for discharging (Reid- Moncrieff e) from employment for the Sept. 13 incident." See Reid-Moncrieff e and Dep- uty Head (Department of Citizenship and Immigration), 2014 PSLRB 25 (Can. Public Service Lab. Rel. Bd.).

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