A labour board said a Canadian government agency which overpaid employees thousands of dollars by direct deposit waited too long to recover the money, according to Blacklock’s Reporter. .“She lived in Ontario, worked in Ontario, and was paid in Ontario, and the National Research Council is headquartered in Ontario,” said Public Sector Labour Relations Board (PSLRB) adjudicator David Orfald in a ruling. .“Its compensation services are based in Ontario, and the author of the demand for repayment worked in Ontario.”.Canadian government lawyers likened the mistake to a lottery for lucky winners. .“Federal employees who have been overpaid are in debt to their employer,” said its lawyers. .They said applying provincial limitation periods depending on where employees worked “would result in a lottery approach to the collection of overpayments.”.Six employees of the National Research Council (NRC) protested when management attempted to claw back overpayments. Five employees settled, and one took her case to the PSLRB. .NRC administrator Veronique St-Onge received eight weeks’ pay totalling $7,674 by direct deposit in 2019. St-Onge was on leave without pay at the time. .The NRC discovered its error in 2022 and began clawing back the overpayment at $15 biweekly. .Canadian government lawyers argued the NRC was within its rights under a six-year limit on debt recovery under the Crown Liability and Proceeding Act. St-Onge argued a lapsed deadline of two years applied under the Ontario Limitations Act and that she should keep the money. .Orfald said management “made some mistakes.” He added it had plenty of time to initiate the collection of its overpayment and waited too long. .Records published on July 16 show taxpayers are owed more than $500 million because of mistakes made by the Phoenix Pay System. .READ MORE: Phoenix pay system $553 million overpayment still unrecovered.One Canadian government department started writing off the extra money paid to employees who died. .“Since the launch of Phoenix, approximately 389,500 employees have been identified as having received either an administrative overpayment or true overpayment totalling $3.08 billion as of April 24,” said cabinet.
