Employment Contracts - The Bread and Butter of Employment Law!
Carefully crafted Employment Contract, Employment Agreement, Independent Contractor Agreement by experienced employment lawyers to ensure legal enforceability. Seek employment law legal advice before accepting any job offer or any "severance package" or "termination package" to protect employment law entitlements.
Why Do I Need an Employment Lawyer to Help Me Draft An Employment Contract?
In employment law context, any contractual term that attempts to limit an employee’s entitlement to the Employment Standards Act (ESA) minimum standard is under strict scrutiny. Employment agreement drafting is substance over form and a lot of legal issues are involved, and drafting enforceable employment agreement contractual terms in an employment contract is becoming more of an art than a science. It takes an experienced employment lawyer to draft a legally enforceable employment contract.
An employment agreement is a contract that requires offer, mutual agreement, consideration and acceptance. In employment law context, if an employer has acted in a way that forms an expectation, even if it’s more than the ESA minimum standards requires, the employer is estopped from not honouring such expectation. In employment law, an employer cannot change the contractual terms of the employment contract unilaterally without valuable consideration in exchange. Do note that a promise for continue employment, in employment law context, DOES NOT count as a valuable consideration in exchange.
Independent Contractor Agreement vs. Misclassification
In employment law, an independent contractor employment agreement is important in its own right. In employment law, time and time again, the Court keep emphasizing and hammer home the message that misclassification is prohibited under both the Common law and the Employment Standards Act (ESA).
What is Misclassification?
In employment law context, misclassification occurs when a worker is assigned to a different category than the one he or she should be in. Some employers try to circumvent the ESA by assigning workers who look like, smell like, sound like employees to fill independent contractor positions. In many employment law cases, the independent contractors in question are deemed to have been misclassified, and as such are eligible to all employment law entitlements that are reserved for employees.
How to Draft a Legally Enforceable Independent Contract Agreement?
As established in many employment law cases, an independent contractor agreement is substance over form and a lot of employment law legal issues are involved, and as such a well-drafted independent contractor agreement save everyone's headache down the road.
Having a carefully crafted independent contractor agreement by an experienced employment lawyer setting out the intentions of the parties is crucial, to make sure you don’t end up creating an employer-employee relationship inadvertently, if you are the payor hiring the independent contractor. In contrast, if you are a worker, you want to consult an employment lawyer to make sure you fully appreciate your rights and responsibilities, and legal ramifications before signing an independent contractor employment agreement.
