He ran nights for 18 years, then got moved to days over a theft suspicion
A grocery and produce company that moved a long-serving night shift supervisor to days after suspecting theft did not constructively dismiss him, an appeal tribunal has ruled, wiping out part of a wage award the company had been ordered to pay.
The British Columbia Employment Standards Tribunal released the decision on July 28, 2026, in an appeal by Fruiticana Produce Ltd. of an earlier order to pay a former night shift supervisor for overtime, vacation, statutory holiday pay and length of service. Member Richard Grounds allowed the appeal in part, setting aside the length-of-service award while confirming the rest.
The worker had run the night shift at one of the company's Surrey warehouses since November 2005. In July 2023, the company told him to switch to days. He stopped showing up, and that December he filed a complaint alleging he had been constructively dismissed and was owed unpaid overtime.
An adjudicating delegate of the Director of Employment Standards, Felisa Friesen, sided with the worker in an April 2025 determination. Because he had worked nights for more than 18 years, she found, the move to days was a fundamental change to his terms of employment, and she concluded he had been dismissed rather than having quit.
On appeal, Grounds found the delegate had looked only at the worker's long history on nights while failing to consider why the...
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