Canadian HR Reporter, a Thomson Reuters business 2015
June
24,
2015
|
Canadian
Employment
Law
Today
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
JEFFREY R. SMITH
Jeffrey R. Smith is the editor of Canadian
Employment Law Today. He can be reached at
jeffrey.r.smith@thomsonreuters.com, or visit www.
employmentlawtoday.com for more information.
CREDIT: PHIL.TINKLER/SHUTTERSTOCK
are allowed to exit the parking lot without
paying the parking charges, there is a loss to
the employer."
According to the account of both Haylu
and the customer, there was no doubt Haylu
accepted $40 in cash from the customer and
allowed her to leave when she had an amount
of $70 owing, said the arbitrator. e custom
-
er was willing to pay the full fee on her credit
card, but she was just having difficulty with
the machine. e difference in their testimo-
nies was that Haylu claimed to have called the
manager and received instructions to take the
$40. e customer denied seeing this and saw
Haylu put the money in his pocket.
e arbitrator found the customer had no
interest in the outcome of the case or mo
-
tivation to lie, so her credibility was greater
than Haylu's, who had reason to put himself
in a better light. Since the manager's report
didn't mention anything about the call or any
knowledge of the $40 before the customer
reported the incident, Haylu's credibility was
low, said the arbitrator.
e arbitrator noted that while the man
-
ager was later fired for theft, he was not at the
parking lot for all of the cancelled tickets. He
was in charge of other lots and was only at
Haylu's lot occasionally — Haylu was the only
one there during all of the incidents. In addi
-
tion, it didn't make sense for the manager to
file a report to Allpark's head office regarding
the customer's complaint if he was guilty of
pocketing money for cancelled tickets — he
would have wanted to cover it up, said the
arbitrator.
While it was possible both Haylu and the
manager were involved in the scam, this
didn't exonerate Haylu, said the arbitrator.
In fact, Haylu was aware of the policy to file
reports of cancelled tickets, but he did not.
Also, if he truly thought the customer might
qualify for free parking because her husband
was in a wheelchair, it didn't explain why he
asked her to pay $40.
e arbitrator pointed out that other than
the Sept. 6 incident, all the other instances of
ticket cancellations were circumstantial evi
-
dence. However, the employer was aware of
this and didn't act until it had the report of
the Sept. 6 incident, which justified its suspi-
cions. e incident amounted to dishonesty
on Haylu's part and was a serious breach of
the employment contract deserving of disci-
pline. Given the likelihood that it was part of
a scam that had been going on for some time
and Haylu never apologized for his involve-
ment, Allpark had just cause for dismissal,
said the arbitrator.
e grievance was dismissed and the dis-
missal upheld.
For more information see:
• Allpark/Metropolitan Parking Inc. and Hos-
pitality and Service Trades Union, Local 261
(Haylu), Re, 2015 CarswellOnt 6315 (Ont.
Arb.).
