0959-01-ES Naturland Inc., Applicant v. Emmanouella Leonidakis, Abelardo Gunda, Mei Tang and Ministry of Labour, Responding Parties.

Employment Practices Branch File Nos. 30014759, 30013931 and 30012688

BEFORE: Mary Ellen Cummings, Alternate Chair.

DECISION OF THE BOARD; July 31, 2001

1. This is an employer’s appeal of 3 Orders to Pay, issued on December 18, 2000; April 27, 2000 and May 7, 1999. The appeal was made on June 28, 2001 considerably outside the statutory appeal period of 45 days.

2. Section 68 of the Employment Standards Act (the “Act”) permits the Board to grant an extension of time and make an otherwise untimely appeal timely, if the Board considers it appropriate to do so.

3. The applicant claims that it never received the Orders to Pay. It asserts that it never received any notice of the claims, and so, it did not have an opportunity to dispute them. The applicant became aware of the Orders to Pay when a collection agency got involved.

4. At the request of the Board, the Ministry of Labour provided copies of each of the letters it sent to the applicant, accompanying the Orders to Pay. Each letter was sent to the address which the applicant identifies as the business address, and each was sent to the attention of the person who the applicant identifies as responsible for these matters.

5. It seems most unlikely that none of the three Orders to Pay, sent at separate times, would not have reached the applicant. It is more likely, I conclude, that the applicant received the Orders to Pay, but ignored them until such time as the involvement of the collection agency made them impossible to ignore.

6. I am not satisfied that the applicant has provided reasons that would make it appropriate for the Board to grant an extension of time.

DISPOSITION

7. This application is dismissed because it is untimely.

“Mary Ellen Cummings”

for the Board