Court was not persuaded that the inclusion of the annual bonus was erroneous
A restaurant in Vancouver will have to pay its former head chef nearly $30,000 after the court sided with the employee who filed a lawsuit claiming that he was not given his bonus. British Columbia’s Employment Standards Branch ordered the restaurant to pay the head chef $25,917.80 in wages, $1,555.07 in annual vacation, and $1,495.72 in interest.
The decision also included a $500 fine for the restaurant after it violated section 18 of the Employment Standards Act, CBC reported. According to the section, as posted on the government's website, "an employer must pay all wages owing to an employee within 48 hours after the employer terminates the employment."
The lawsuit
The case began after head chef filed a lawsuit in December 2021 alleging that the company did not give him his bonus money as stipulated in their negotiated incentive bonus programme. The chef, who has been with the company for eight years now, has been earning a salary of $102,500 a year, according to CBC's report, with an additional thousands of dollars more following an agreement between the head chef and the restaurant in January 2019.
The amount will be based on the performance of the restaurant, said CBC in another report, with $15,000 a year and an additional $3,750 per quarter if the company did better than expected.
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A specific "annual bonus" was also included in the agreement, which is "10% of the difference when the food and beverage revenue was higher than what they'd budgeted for the year," CBC reported. The head chef resigned in November that year, saying that his last day will be on January 15, 2020. He was still on track to receive his annual bonus, but an email from the company said that the "annual bonus" had been included in the agreement by mistake.
The company later decided to terminate him on January 2, with all outstanding wages paid for except the agreed upon bonus for the employee. According to the petitioner, the restaurant had "no right to cancel the annual bonus."
The court agreed with this, and said it was not convinced that the company would only find the error on the agreement almost a year after it was signed, while also doubting the time of the discovery of the error. The company and the employee agreed on a hefty allowance because the head chef could bring in publicity after participating in Top Chef Canada.
