Sent on August 25, 2020

 

Dear APSA members,

You have recently received communication from SFU Labour Relations regarding the AD 10.13 policy on hours of work and compliance with the BC Employment Standards Act (ESA). The subject line of the email was: Important Message to All APSA Members and APSA Supervisors.

Unfortunately, the email and FAQs have raised a number of questions from many of you. We will try to answer these questions here, as best we can.

We recently won a year-long grievance regarding APSA members who weren't being appropriately compensated for extra hours/overtime. This was because the University and a key part of policy AD 10.13 were in contravention of the ESA.

APSA and the University now need to renegotiate part of AD 10.13 so that it both complies with the ESA and to ensure that all of you are compensated appropriately for your extra hours. We believe the appropriate place to do this is in bargaining.

APSA doesn’t approve or condone this recent communication from the University. The communication was authored by the University with little input from APSA. We're also concerned that the communication may recommend procedures that are in contravention of other aspects of the APSA agreement, such as the variable scheduled workweek.

For the reasons listed above, APSA considers this communication to you as an interim measure put in place by the University as a result of their admission that they were in contravention of the ESA.

To answer some other questions you may have about the communication:

1)    There is no legal requirement to submit overtime hours within two business days. For example, you may have fallen ill, taken time off, or may be attending a conference or course and can’t fulfill the University’s two-day requirement. You are, however, expected to report your overtime in a reasonably prompt manner.

2)    Please be vigilant in recording and reporting your overtime hours and in receiving compensation for that overtime, even while working from home.

3)    Rest assured, we will pursue legitimate back pay for members who have kept records of their past overtime.  Compensation for overtime will be still be owed to you as long as that overtime has legitimately occurred.

4)    The interim measure put in place by the University, and any new policy for APSA members must be applied consistently and fairly across all units within the University per AD 10.01, article 1.03. If this interim measure isn’t being consistently and fairly applied, we will challenge this.

5)   The communication from Labour Relations is what’s called “without prejudice or precedent.”  This means, for example, that we can still challenge whether APSA members have been incorrectly classified as managers and or non-managers.  If there is such a dispute, APSA will use the provisions of the ESA to guide our case. If you question whether you are a manager for purposes of overtime compensation, please speak to APSA before talking to your supervisor and your HR Strategic Business Partner.

Please do report to us any concerns about your status as a manager (for overtime compensation purposes) or any other anomalies in applying these new hours of work practices.

Thank you for your time.

Andrew Boden
Executive Director, APSA