The owner of a Burns Lake sawmill has convinced the B.C. Employment Standards Tribunal (EST) to reverse a decision requiring it to pay a management-level employee $7,600 in wages for time worked beyond 40 hours per week.
In a decision reached Feb. 8, EST member Carol L. Roberts agreed with Babine Forest Products Ltd. and its owner, Hampton Affiliates, that the delegate who made the original decision erred in law in interpreting the employment contract Larry Higginson had signed with the employer.
Higginson had been the head electrician since 1990 and had the option of taking time off or receiving additional pay for overtime work.
But when the company was sold to a new owner, Hampton Affiliates, in late 2006, it became an issue. "In protest," Higginson said he signed a contract that stated, in part, "overtime is not compensable" and his job may include evening and weekend work.
In July 2009, Higginson requested compensation for overtime and when that was denied, he took his complaint to the EST and won a decision in Sept. 2010.
In the original decision, the EST found Higginson was entitled to wages at a straight time rate of pay for 149 hours of work. By virtue of being a manager, Higginson was not entitled time-and-a-half but was entitled to wages for hours worked under the Employment Standards Act.
Moreover, Hampton's employer's salaried handbook, issued six weeks after Higginson signed the contract, stated the normal workweek consists of 40 hours and failed to note managers are exempted from the policy or make it clear in the contract that Higginson was excluded.
But in the appeal, Roberts found the contract Higginson signed was not ambiguous.
"It expressly and clearly stated that in order for Mr. Higginson to accomplish certain responsibilities and accountabilities, he might have to work evenings and weekends," Roberts said. "It clearly provided that overtime was not compensable."
By mid Oct. 2009, Higginson, who was earning a salary of $8,050 a month, was no longer working for Babine.
