Waiting to accept employee’s resignation

Question: Does the nature of an employee’s job (such as a key role in a team that the employer can’t afford to be vacant) affect how long an employer has to wait to accept an employee’s resignation that came in anger?

Answer: There is no set amount of time that an employer must wait to accept a resignation, but there are compelling reasons why an employer should wait at least some time before accepting a resignation. Ensuring that the resignation was tendered voluntarily is a much more important factor in deciding when to accept a resignation than the nature of the employee’s job.

Resignations need no acceptance in order to permit the employee to leave the employment relationship. The acceptance of an employee’s resignation by an employer only makes it irrevocable by the employee. The law recognizes that sometimes, if angry, frustrated or faced with hard-handed tactics, an employee may make a rash decision to quit; which is why resignations need to be made voluntarily to be effective.

In the unionized environment, resignation includes a subjective intention to leave the employment relationship as well as objective conduct that would allow that intention to be realized. If resignation is given voluntarily and after careful consideration by the employee, it does not require acceptance by the employer to be effective unless there is specific contractual language to that effect (see London (City) v. London Professional Fire Fighters Assn.

It is not always to the benefit of the employer to immediately accept a resignation because resignations given in anger, frustration, or on the spur of the moment are sometimes vitiated because they are not considered to be voluntary.

One reason employers should take a moment when accepting a resignation comes from Alberta v. A.U.P.E. It states that one consideration in determining the voluntariness of a resignation is if the employer should have taken more care prior to accepting the resignation. This principle was applied in Robertson v. Deputy Head (Department of National Defence), where the employer was found to have exercised appropriate care before accepting a resignation. The employer initially encouraged the employee to take time to think about tendering resignation, to exercise different options and was patient with them throughout their decision to resign. This prevented a finding of constructive dismissal.

In the non-unionized environment, courts have similarly held that unless there are bylaws or contractual provisions stating otherwise, acceptance is not a requisite for resignation to be effective, see Howard v. Saint John (City). An employee may choose to end the employment relationship as she desires, but the terms of a specific employment contract would have a large bearing on how advisable such a move might be. Generally, contracts have conditions for termination, which could result in penalties if not adhered to by either party. If the conditions entailed penalties for early cancellation, or a specified notice period that was not followed, it could mean liability for the resigning party.

For more information see:

• London (City) v. London Professional Fire Fighters Assn., 2009 CarswellOnt 8325 (Ont. Arb.).
• Alberta v. A.U.P.E., 2012 CarswellAlta 1037 (Alta. Arb.).
• Robertson v. Deputy Head (Department of National Defence), 2014 CarswellNat 2395 (Can. Public Service Lab. Rel. Bd.).
• Howard v. Saint John (City), 1951 CarswellNB 22 (N.B. Ch.).