An 18-year manager thought the bottle was bound for the trash, until her boss called it theft
A veteran liquor store manager wrote off a whiskey bottle she thought was defective, then donated it to a charity auction. Her employer called it theft and fired her. An arbitrator disagreed, found a lapse in judgment rather than theft, and sent her back to work.
In a decision dated July 14, 2026, arbitrator Koml Kandola ordered British Columbia's Liquor Distribution Branch to reinstate the store manager with no loss of seniority, substituting a three-month unpaid suspension for her dismissal. The grievance, brought by the BC General Employees' Union, arose after she removed a bottle worth about $135, which later sold at a charity silent auction for $725.
It began on the sales floor of a British Columbia liquor store in October 2024. After a clerk stocked a new display of whiskey, the store manager, a nearly 18-year employee with a clean record, came over to review it. She testified that she found one bottle with a dented box and a damaged safety seal, and concluded it could not be sold.
According to her evidence, she meant to log the bottle as defective but picked the wrong code, recording it instead as in-store breakage. Store video showed her acting in plain view. She put the bottle in her bag, paid for other items but not that one, and later donated it to a charity silent auction, where it sold for $725.
A clerk soon noticed the bottle...
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