Worker didn't want to go on assignment shortly before date of resignation
A worker quit his job immediately when he refused an assignment after giving three weeks’ notice of resignation, an adjudicator has ruled.
Robert Allen was a truck driver for G.K. Morse Trucking, a trucking and excavating contracting company based in Centreville, N.S. Allen was hired in November 2011 and worked with the company for two years.
On Dec. 18, 2013, Allen told the company’s dispatcher that he was leaving G.K. Morse effective Jan. 10, 2014. Allen had made plans to join another trucking company and felt two weeks’ notice was enough, though it was in fact more than three weeks until his resignation date. The reason for revealing his intended resignation more than two weeks before was due to a pending delivery he was assigned that would take him to Connecticut over the holiday season. Allen had made plans for New Year’s Eve and if he made the trip to Connecticut there was a chance he wouldn’t be home in time.
A couple of days later, on Dec. 20, Allen provided a written resignation to reinforce the verbal resignation he had given. He heard nothing until Dec. 23, when the company’s owner, Ken Morse, called him.
Morse told Allen that if Allen didn’t make the delivery to Connecticut, he wouldn’t get paid. He was angry because he felt Allen could make the delivery and be back in time for New Year’s. According to Allen, Morse said that his employment was terminated and he should clean out his truck so another driver could make the trip to Connecticut the next day.
Another driver made the delivery to Connecticut and Allen received no more assignments before his resignation date of Jan. 10, 2014. When he failed to receive a paycheque for his final pay period up to that date, he filed a claim for unjust dismissal. G.K. Morse argued Allen’s refusal on Dec. 18 to make the trip to Connecticut constituted a resignation on that date, which was confirmed in his conversation with the owner, Ken Morse, on Dec. 23.
The adjudicator noted that every employee had the right to resign whenever he wanted, subject to reasonable notice of his intention to do so. Though Allen believed two weeks was appropriate, there was no employment contract that stipulated that was the case and in any rate he provided more notice than that for his intended resignation date.
The adjudicator also said that if the employer wishes the employee to continue to work through the notice period, the employee is obligated to do so — the employer has the right to waive the notice period but there is no obligation to do it.
“An employee who wishes to quit and wishes to resign his position as an employee must live up to the terms of his employment agreement and accordingly work for his employer for the full term of the notice,” said the adjudicator. “The departing employee who gives notice of resignation is required to remain and continue with his duties to the end of the notice term.”
The adjudicator found the delivery trip to Connecticut was a normal event in G.K. Morse’s business and Allen’s assignment to do it was part of his job duties — if his preference was not to do it then he should have resigned before the scheduled date of the trip. Allen’s refusal to accept the assignment was “inconsistent with his obligations as an employee” and G.K. Morse was free to take it to mean he immediately quit his job, said the adjudicator.
