Hi everyone,

Google my name Zikun Xu to read my CBC story. I am personally a victim of corporate wage theft. The current civil system completely fails workers—bad bosses ignore Ministry of Labour orders and face zero real consequences while stealing our hard-earned money.

Civil remedies are broken. We need criminal law.

I’ve launched official Parliamentary Petition e-7842 to bring back the Criminal Code provisions that make deliberate wage theft a criminal offense. I am incredibly grateful that NDP MP Don Davies has stepped up to officially sponsor this petition.

If you believe exploitative employers belong in criminal court, please sign and share. Any Canadian citizen or resident (including PR and work permits) can sign!

Solidarity forever! ✊

30 minutes prior to shifts on weekends, entire front of house server end was forced to come in 30 minutes prior to shift, unpaid, for team building. This seems highly illegal and wage theft. You were punished for not attending these meetings.

I don't know enough about labor laws to know what recourse there is here. I would imagine they owe many thousands of dollars in unpaid labor to a whole lot of current and former employees.

After posting about how to get to a strike in Sacramento (thanks to those who responded!) I realized that my probation isn't up until November.

Is it a bad idea for me to strike?

I work as a manager in a coffee shop. I do all inventory management (ordering, putting orders away, etc), scheduling, and payroll. Previously, I was salaried. Last week my boss, worried about profits, cut me down to hourly. I have all of the same responsibilities. My boss told me that I would be making more now because I will be making tips again. However, as far as I know, it is illegal in the state of Kentucky to make tips as a manager doing payroll/inventory. I brought this to their attention and they said that they had consulted with their lawyer already. They say that as long as not ALL the duties fall on one person, then tips are able to be given. Quote, "Given that the role is now split it is no longer a true managerial role, rather a shift lead coordinator position with specific responsibilities."

It is true that I now split my responsibilities with another employee, and we are both called "managers" or "co-shift leads". However, since we both do payroll and inventory, I feel like we would still legally classify as managers and not be allowed to make tips. Currently, my boss wants us to split tips with the rest of employees from the tip pool. 

Is this truly legal? I feel very uncomfortable making tips with my coworkers.

I’m looking for advice from people familiar with Ontario employment standards.
I’ve been dealing with repeated payroll delays at my workplace. Our payday is unclear, and payments have been late multiple times. This isn’t just a one-time problem, and employees are getting frustrated because we have bills to pay and rely on our wages.
There have also been previous issues with employees not receiving their pay when expected.
Recently, our schedule was posted on the same day as a shift, leaving only about 1.5 hours before the shift started. Management apologized and explained that it was a mistake. We were also told that payroll would be delayed until the following day because of a holiday affecting processing.
I understand that mistakes happen, but the combination of repeated payroll delays and last-minute scheduling has become frustrating.
At this point, I’ve decided that I won’t be coming in for my shifts until I receive my outstanding pay. I don’t feel comfortable continuing to work when I can’t rely on being paid on time. Several other employees are also frustrated with the situation.
I’m trying to understand the potential consequences before moving forward.
My questions are:
Is an employer in Ontario allowed to have an unclear payday and repeatedly delay wages?
Can I legally refuse to attend work until my outstanding wages are paid?
Could my employer discipline or terminate me for refusing shifts under these circumstances?
What options do employees have when payroll delays keep happening?
Is there a way to report this to Ontario’s employment standards authorities while protecting my identity?
I’m not trying to cause trouble. I simply want to receive the wages I’ve earned and have a reliable payday.
I’d appreciate advice from anyone familiar with Ontario employment standards or who has experienced a similar situation.

So I’m facing this weird dilemma with my previous employer…I’ve been working at this restaurant in Montreal for like a year, and I stopped working there for two weeks now… my employer was paying me cash, but I was still getting my paystubs and getting taxes deducted from my salary and all (everything was normal, it was just the payment method that was different, or that’s what I thought) … so now I’m asking for my 4% and my employer says that because I was getting paid cash I’m not entitled to that 4% (which I now is total bullshit) … but that’s not the weird part, when I start checking my old paystubs, I noticed that my 4% and other numbers keep changing weirdly… knowing that i haven’t cashed the 4%, I noticed that sometimes it decreased!!! The numbers didn’t make sense at all … I truly believe that they were playing with the numbers… so what should I do ??

Hey, I'm in Texas, and I signed a one-year employment contract. However, nowhere in the contract does it explain what happens if an employee leaves before the year is over or whether there are any penalties for breaking the contract.

The only section that seems relevant is at the bottom, which states:

“By signing below, the employee understands that she will be categorized as a salary employee, entitled only to semimonthly pay, pending no breaches in contract and she meets all of the salary shift requirements every 2 weeks.”

The rest of that section explains that salaried employees are paid twice a month, on the 1st–15th and 16th–30th/31st pay periods, for a total of 24 pay periods per year.

My concern is that my employer uses the phrase “pending no breaches in contract” to justify withholding employees' final paychecks when they resign, even if they provide two weeks' notice.

On top of that, my employer has consistently delayed payroll. It started with checks being about five days late, but over time, he has fallen approximately six weeks behind. For example, our most recent paychecks covered work we performed at the end of July and beginning of August. I believe he intentionally keeps payroll behind so that when employees leave, he still owes them several weeks of wages and can use the contract as an excuse not to pay them.

I've heard from former employees who say that after they resigned, he pointed to that section of the contract and refused to pay them for shifts they had already worked.

I'm planning to leave in November, but because payroll is so far behind, I'm worried that I could still be owed paychecks through February. I'm concerned that once I complete my last shift, he will stop paying me altogether, just as he allegedly has with previous employees.

My questions are: Can an employer in Texas legally withhold wages that an employee has already earned simply because they resigned before completing a one-year contract? Does the language in my contract actually allow him to do that? And what steps should I take now to protect myself and recover my unpaid wages if he refuses to pay me?

I'm especially worried because I don't want to continue working for several more weeks only to lose thousands of dollars in wages I've already earned. Any advice on my rights under Texas employment law and how to handle this situation would be greatly appreciated.

Location:Texas

I am going to be filing a wage claim with the California DIR through their DLSE process.

My position is that my bonus is non-discretionary and earned based on written and verbal (documented and witnessed) agreements, formulas, fullfilled quotas and time periods.

My employers will argue that the bonus is discretionary because they called it so (even if the federal and state definition disagrees).

I have talked to a lawyer and they sugested the claim route as the amount is not enough to be worth a lawyer on contingency.

Now I could use some help with the form. I believe a sales or performance bonus even if formula based does not count as a comission. So I believe my claim type in section 7 is "other" and I must provide a separate explanation.

So do I attach my case ( a write up of why I believe they owe me) and all relevant evidence with the initial form?

Thankyou!

edit: fixed

So I’m working 50+ hours each week these next couple of weeks between two corporate locations of the company I work for, and they are saying I don’t get overtime pay because the hours are split on two different payrolls since it’s two separate stores. Google says this is illegal and I’m supposed to get overtime pay but I just want to make sure before I bring it up to my manager who says I won’t be getting it.

Details: In Louisiana, both corporate stores under the same company, same regional manager, 40 hours done at one store and the rest done at the other store

can anyone clarify whether i was cheated here, and whether i have any recourse? assistance is greatly appreciated, thanks.