Gander technician wins overtime ruling for deployment travel

I.M.P. Group Limited violated the Canada Labour Code by paying an aircraft maintenance engineer straight time for required travel between Gander and Comox after his regular 40-hour workweeks, an arbitrator has ruled.

In a March 12, 2026 award involving IMP and the Public Service Alliance of Canada, arbitrator David G. L. Buffett declared Richard Hynes entitled to time-and-a-half for the disputed travel, including the specified two-hour check-in and two-hour check-out periods. The award did not fix a dollar amount.

Buffett rejected IMP’s alternative argument that meal, incidental, deployment and mileage payments made the overall compensation package at least as favourable as statutory overtime. Those benefits served different purposes and could not simply be added together to offset the overtime entitlement.

Travel followed completed workweeks

Hynes worked as an aircraft maintenance engineer at IMP’s Gander operation. After completing a Monday-to-Friday, 40-hour week, he was required to travel to the employer’s Comox worksite in British Columbia on December 2 and 3, 2023.

He worked two regular weeks in Comox and travelled back to Gander on December 16 and 17, again after completing a 40-hour workweek. The disputed journeys took place on weekends.

The collective agreement’s travel clause provided straight-time pay even for travel on weekends and statutory holidays. It counted specified check-in and check-out periods and time waiting for connections, but excluded overnight stopovers.

At arbitration, PSAC did not challenge whether IMP had followed that contractual provision. Its position was that the provision could not reduce the minimum overtime entitlement under the Canada Labour Code.

IMP argued that travelling as a passenger on a commercial flight was not work. Hynes was not performing aircraft maintenance during the journey or carrying tools or spare parts. Alternatively, the employer said the full package of travel-related payments exceeded what statutory overtime would provide.

Deployment travel was part of the job

Buffett found that Hynes was working while travelling to and from Comox. The travel was required by, and undertaken for the benefit of, the employer. Flying in support of operations and travelling to other operating bases were among the position’s key responsibilities.

The absence of hands-on maintenance during the flight did not change that conclusion. Buffett also rejected the suggestion that the parties could avoid statutory minimums simply by agreeing that an activity was not work.

His reasoning distinguished the required cross-country journeys from standby or rest periods. It also distinguished travel between accommodation and a local worksite, and the intervening weekend Hynes had off in Comox. The award does not create a general entitlement to overtime for ordinary commuting or every hour spent away from home.

The employer had relied on past practice and earlier interest arbitrations in which the union had sought, but not obtained, overtime for travel outside regular hours. Buffett held that those outcomes and the parties’ past intentions could not displace statutory rights and obligations.

Allowances were not substitutes for overtime

The comparison between a contractual benefit and a statutory entitlement had to take account of their purposes, Buffett held. A benefit serving a different purpose could not be treated as equivalent merely because it increased the employee’s total receipts.

Meal and incidental payments recognized expenses associated with being away from home. They would also have been payable if the employee travelled within his regular workweek, rather than beyond it.

The separate $40 daily deployment payment applied to Saturdays, Sundays and statutory holidays when an employee remained deployed without actively working, including travel days. It did not compensate for the same thing as working beyond regular hours. Mileage payments likewise recognized vehicle expenses and wear, rather than time spent travelling.

Buffett treated the specified check-in and check-out periods differently: they formed part of the travel-time calculation. He described them as a reasonable estimate of time needed for airport check-in, security, baggage collection and getting to the destination after landing.

The proper comparison was therefore between the hourly travel rate paid and the time-and-a-half rate to which Hynes was entitled, not between overtime and the entire collection of travel benefits.

The decision established the statutory breach and overtime entitlement, leaving quantum separate. It provided a 30-day period following publication of the award for the parties to refer an unresolved amount back to the arbitrator if they could not agree. It did not determine a final payment total.