Case Description

Good afternoon, I am writing to hopefully be provided advise how to proceed regarding an issue that I am having with my payroll at work.

After my performance review in September 2009, I was told that I was going to be getting a raise to $44,000.

To give you some background, I was hired in June 2007 at a base salary of $35,000 with a variable bonus of $5000 for a total of $40,000. My first pay from RBC was in the amount of $1425.10. This amount remained the same (paid twice a month) until March of 2009 when I joined the Profit Sharing Plan and my pay changed to $1357.05 with the new deduction.

So once I received by first pay with my new “raise” I realized that it was less than I usually received. After calculating my old pay amounts I realized that I had been making $45, 000 since I had started. It turned out that a bonus that should have only been on one pay cheque per month had been applied to every pay. Since it has been that way since I started, I did not realize that this was incorrect. It resulted in a $5000 overpayment per year.

I brought this to the attention of my immediate boss and my branch manager. He questioned why I hadn’t noticed it earlier. I said that my pays had always been consistent since day one. The first year that I filed my tax return after starting to work for Dominion Securities, I had two T3’s so it was not clear that I had been overpaid at that time. When I filed my next tax return, for 2008 (in March of 2009), I obviously filed at the $45,000 amount, but since I had been the RBC for 2 years and always received very good performance reviews, I just figured I had received a raise.

The branch manager decided that he would only make me re-pay ½ ($5000 instead of $10,000) which would result in a repayment of $204 per month over 2 years.

This situation pushed me to look for new employment as it is very disheartening to be a employee who is consistently praised for being a good employee, to now be clearing less than when I started 2 ½ years ago. I have recently found a new job outside of RBC and gave my 2 weeks notice. The branch manager now wants me to repay the entire outstanding amount (approx $4300).

Recently, my branch manager informed me that I will not receive my last pay cheque if this is not resolved by my last day (Feb 5, 2010).

After doing some research on employment law in Canada, it looks like overpayments that occurred over an extended period of time are not always recoverable by the employer. I was paid the same amount from my first day on the job until November 2009 (2 years and 4 months). With my new pay amount as well as the deductions that they are taking off my pay to recover the overpayment, I am now making almost 10% less than I was when I started which is very difficult.


I’m hoping you can advise through paid legal consultation if required and if there is anything that I can do about this situation or if I’m just going to have to take out a loan and repay.