Can Severance Pay Ontario Be Offered For Interns?
Severance Pay Ontario
No one likes to lose their job, but when it does happen, the experience is especially devastating. It can be hard to figure out where you’ll work next, how you’ll pay your bills and cover expenses in the meantime. If you’re a terminated employee in Ontario, you may be entitled to significant compensation. But many employers try to use legal loopholes and poorly written termination clauses to minimize what they owe to their employees.
This is why it’s important for employees to understand their rights and know the nitty gritty of severance pay Ontario. An employment lawyer can help.
Severance pay is a payment to an employee after they have been laid off or their employment has been “severed.” The minimum statutory severance in Ontario is 1 week of regular wages for every year of service, up to 26 weeks. The amount of severance that an employer must pay depends on the size of their company and how long the employee worked. However, these minimums are often not enough to meet an employee’s needs and may not reflect the full scope of what they would have been able to expect had they not lost their jobs.
Can Severance Pay Ontario Be Offered For Interns?
The law differs across Canada. In some provinces, internships are considered to be part of a worker’s employment and therefore are covered by provincial labour laws. In other provinces, the distinction is less clear and interns are not guaranteed severance if they are terminated without cause. The laws in Ontario are somewhat confusing because they do not clearly state whether or not unpaid internships are permitted. However, a blitz carried out by the Ontario government a few years ago found that most employers who hosted unpaid interns were in violation of employment standards laws.
A key difference between severance and termination pay is that termination pay is only paid when an employer has the right to do so. Severance pay is a form of compensation that is only required by the ESA when an employer terminates an employee’s employment.
However, the ESA requires that larger employers give their terminated employees more than just the minimum notice and severance pay set out in the legislation. Common law considerations, such as an employee’s tenure and the reason for their job loss, are also taken into account when calculating a severance package. For this reason, it is important to work with a seasoned employment lawyer who can ensure that an employee’s severance package is in line with their entitlements under the law.
This could result in an increase in an employee’s severance package by tens of thousands of dollars. An experienced employment lawyer at Samfiru Tumarkin LLP can use various laws and factors to determine how much an employee is owed and negotiate with their employer to get the maximum payout. The team is available to speak with you about your case at any time. Call us today for a free consultation.