A restaurant paid cash to settle overtime, but never said what for

An Alberta restaurant paid a departing cook thousands of dollars in cash to settle unpaid overtime, but could not say what period the payment covered. Its appeal over the debt was dismissed.

In a decision dated Aug. 20, 2026, Vice-Chair Gordon Nekolaichuk of Alberta's Employment Standards Appeals dismissed the restaurant's appeal, confirming an order requiring the employer to pay a former sous-chef $5,480.53 in unpaid overtime, vacation pay and general holiday pay, along with a $548.05 fee.

Self-tracked hours pile up into a bank of overtime

The dispute traces back to a kitchen job that began no later than July 2024, when the worker started as a sous-chef earning $19 an hour under a contract signed that June. The restaurant left it to him to track his own hours instead of keeping its own records, according to the owner's testimony. He regularly worked more than eight hours a day, banking any hours beyond 88 in a pay period rather than being paid overtime.

The arrangement ended when he resigned on April 16, 2025. Days later he texted the owner asking to be paid for his banked hours, prompting an employment standards officer to investigate. The law limited how far back the officer could look, six months for wage and overtime claims and two years for vacation and holiday pay, so the review covered hours worked between Nov. 14, 2024, and March 26, 2025.

The officer found the restaurant had overpaid regular wages...

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