How Can I Afford Legal Advice if My Business is Sinking?

Can I Afford Legal AdviceHow Can I Afford Legal Advice?

Many employers are facing rock hard choices right now: layoff on shaky legal ground or go bankrupt? Let some employees go, but how to afford termination pay? Offer more than ESA minimums to get a release or risk a claim down the road?

Since early March 2020, we’ve found ourselves regularly telling clients what the technical legal answers are, and then we quickly move to the COVID-19 business reality solution. This new world order is not going away anytime soon and I fully anticipate some new law coming out of this unique moment. Employers cannot afford payroll but employees cannot mitigate their job loss in this job market – so everyone is turning to the pandemic economic crisis as the reason for paying less termination pay or for demanding more of a package. Courts will have to somehow reconcile these competing interests, each of which is based on the same underlying issues caused by COVID-19.

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Rightsizing Your Workforce During COVID-19

resources for employers during COVID-19Unchartered Workplace Waters

For many entrepreneurs and small businesses, the impact of COVID-19 has resulted in unprecedented losses in a short period of time.  It has been a time of incredible stress, uncertainty and countless questions about how you can stay afloat, best manage your team and, eventually, rebuild. 

At SpringLaw, we have been navigating these unchartered waters with our employer clients.  We know how small businesses have been struggling and how business owners are laying up at night wondering how they will see it through to the other side of this tremendous business disruption.

You Are Not Alone!

As an employer, you know you need to pivot and resize your business. You want to do best by your employees, your business model and your own employment.

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Working Safely From Home

working from homeWhat are the employer’s obligations to an employee when an employee is not working in the office? With so many employees now working from home, employers’ health and safety obligations need to be reexamined. 

The Occupational Health and Safety Act and Working From Home

In Ontario, section 3(1) the Occupational Health and Safety Act (“OHSA”) states that it “does not apply to work performed by the owner or occupant or a servant of the owner or occupant to, in or about a private residence or the lands and appurtenances used in connection therewith.”

So, in regular people speak, this means that if your employee is working in their own home OHSA does not apply. 

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New Programs for Employees and Employers During the COVID-19 Crisis: the Canada Emergency Response Benefit and the Canada Emergency Wage Subsidy

COVID-19

The measures introduced to protect us all from COVID-19 have had a huge economic impact on individuals and businesses. The federal government has been rolling out – and changing – various relief measures over the past few weeks. 

Today we will outline two new measures which will likely be helpful to many of the businesses and individuals impacted: the Canada Emergency Response Benefit and the Small Business 75% Wage Subsidy. 

An Alternative to EI: The Canada Emergency Response Benefit

The Canada Emergency Response Benefit (CERB) was announced on March 25, 2020. It is an alternative form of loss of income benefit. 

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Ontario’s New Infectious Disease Emergency Leave

On Thursday, March 19, 2020, the Ontario Legislature passed Bill 186, Employment Standards Amendment Act (Infectious Disease Emergencies), 2020 (“the Bill”). 

The Bill amends the Ontario Employment Standards Act (ESA) adding new job protection for employees affected by COVID-19. This job protection is retroactive to January 25, 2020.

What is the Leave and Do I Still Have to Pay My Employees?

The new leave allows eligible employees to not come to work, and keep their job, in the circumstances set out below. 

Employees who are not at work because they are using this leave provision do not have to be paid. In many cases, they will be entitled to EI. Employees will remain entitled to their benefits while off under this leave.  

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Proposed Changes to the Ontario Employment Standards Act in the Face of the Pandemic

I think we can all agree that the world is a little bonkers lately –  it seems like things are changing and getting more serious by the minute. Between the time I thought I was finished writing and ready to press “publish” Ontario declared a state of emergency. 

We are getting lots of questions from employers about what to do in the face of various impacts from COVID-19, as more and more measures come into place and make it harder for us to go about our daily lives and work.  

For some, businesses are shutting down and contracts to provide services are being cancelled. This is causing employers to think about how to scale back and how to be fair to their employees while also staying afloat. 

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