The City of Toronto recognizes that some employees are required to be available for work at times other than their regularly scheduled work hours and should be compensated when on standby and called in to work.
This policy applies to non-union employees wage grade 8 and below, excluding:
Compensation that employees receive when they are required to be on standby status, whether or not they are called into work.
Compensation that employees receive when they are called into their work sites or required to work from a remote location, whether or not they have been on standby status.
Employees may be required to be on standby status:
If a division requires employees to be on standby status for call-in to the worksite, or to work from a remote location, general managers/executive directors/division heads or their designates:
An employee who is given a pager or cell phone is not automatically assigned to standby status.
Employees who are on standby status must be no further from their work sites than the distance they usually travel to work, unless other arrangements have been made for them to do their work from a remote location.
When employees are on standby they are available for work in various ways:
Employees may be called into work even if they are not on standby status.
If contact cannot be made with an employee who is on standby status or if that employee fails to perform the work required, that employee is ineligible for standby or call-in pay.
Compensation for standby and call-in hours is paid out. There is no maximum on standby and call-in pay.
Employees are paid one hour for every eight hours or less,while on standby status, on a straight time basis.
Employees called in to work are paid a minimum of three hours at their normal overtime rate under the lieu time policy:
i) Employees eligible only for lieu time at straight time, shall be paid at straight time.
ii) Employees eligible for lieu time or pay, at time and a half, shall be paid at time and a half.
Note: Employees who are on standby status and are called in to work receive both standby pay and pay for time worked.
Pay for work performed is counted from the time employees arrive at the work site. If employees can perform the required tasks by working from home all hours worked are considered as call-in, as appropriate, and employees are compensated for hours worked.
Where an employee is required to stay at work beyond his/her regular hours to deal with an emergency situation (for which he/she would have been called in had he/she left the workplace), call-in pay provisions will apply as follows:
i) Employees eligible only for lieu time at straight time, shall be paid at straight time.
ii) Employees eligible for lieu time or pay, at time and a half, shall be paid at time and a half.
General managers/executive directors/division heads or their designates should ensure that they assign employees to standby status through formal communication. They should communicate to other employees who normally carry pagers or cell phones that they are not automatically on standby status.
General managers/executive directors/division heads or their designates are responsible for scheduling employees for standby status and should give employees as much advance notice as possible by establishing rotating schedules.
Some divisions or operational units may wish to distribute the responsibility for standby status amongst all qualified employees. In other divisions or operational units it may be preferable to ask for volunteers to be on standby status.
Employees who have been on standby status and/or called into work must submit their compensation claims on designated forms for standby and call-in hours.
An employee has not left the office. He is called to deal with an operational emergency for which he would have been called in had he gone home. He works 3 hours past his regular day. His normal overtime rate is straight time and he is eligible for lieu time only. In this emergency situation he is paid for 3 hours.
Executive Management Team
June 15, 2001
January 25, 2002