The Effect of Resignation

Resignation by the employee completely eliminates the employee’s rights at common law to receive reasonable notice of termination. By voluntarily resigning, the employee is bringing the contract to it’s end and losing any remedy for a wrongful dismissal. There can be no dismissal if there is a voluntary resignation. Only cases of dismissal trigger employee rights to claim wrongful dismissal.

So, my advice to employees is: “Don’t resign!”.

Often in cases where the employee “resigns”, what really happened was that the employer somehow forced the resignation. In cases such as this, it is sometimes possible to overcome the resignation and characterize the ending of the employment not as a resignation but as a dismissal. This will depend on the facts of each such case. For instance, there was a case where an employee apparently resigned by returning employer’s property, such as computer and office keys, to the employer and leaving the workplace. However, prior to this, the employer had significantly reduced the pay of the employee, allowing the court to conclude that the reduction in pay constituted a constructive dismissal of the employee, and thus there was a dismissal, not a resignation. The employee went on to win a wrongful dismissal claim against the employer.

My advice is that if you are at the point of resignation, before you do anything else, contact me at Dismissal.ca and tell me your story.