Do non-union employees get the same entitlement as union employees working at the same company?
By Howard Levitt | May 31, 2013
Deborah asked:
I work with a company here in Ontario where the majority of the employees belong to a union. According to the union contract, after one year of employment, the employee is entitled to an increase of from two to now four weeks of vacation. As a non-union employee, have I the same entitlement? Under the old management, we received our vacation and statutory holiday pay with our pay. We just took it when we wanted, and did not get any pay when we were off. With new management, we were given two weeks of vacation with pay per year.
Howard Levitt answered:
If you are not in a union, the provisions of its collective agreement are completely irrelevant to your employment, so your vacation pay is unrelated to theirs. Most employers will match union benefits for their non-union employees so they don't also unionize. But they have no obligation to do so.