An Ontario blockchain business must pay two of its employees approximately $120,000 each after the Ontario Labour Relations Board (OLRB) concluded its plan to pay half of their wages in the Company’s own cryptocurrency violated the province’s Employment Standards Act, 2000.
According to OLRB Board member Roslyn McGilvery, the workers each signed identical employment contracts promising $240,000 in “base salary” with compensation to be paid 50% in cash and 50% in Kinglory’s KGC cryptocurrency.
However, the OLRB ruled that once the Company had specified the employees’ base salary as $240,000, “it was not open to the Employer to pay their wages in a method other than those stipulated in subsection 11(2) of the Act — that is by cash, cheque or direct deposit.”
The KGC cryptocurrency did not constitute legal tender. Accounting for the Company’s existing payments made to the employees over their 40-week employment, as well as their vacation pay entitlements, that left $116,742 still owing to each, the OLRB concluded.
In the most recent decision, the OLRB notes that if Kinglory’s contract had presented the compensation package as a base salary of $120,000, plus an additional benefit of KGC tokens worth $120,000, this “may have been persuasive.”
Tap the link to read the OLRB decision: https://ow.ly/f6cw50T7Jwk
