The British Columbia Human Rights Tribunal has dismissed a former Whole Foods Market employee’s race and disability discrimination complaint, including allegations that untranslated performance-review forms adversely affected her employment.
In Moradi v. Whole Foods Market, 2026 BCHRT 216, issued October 14, tribunal member Jonathan Chapnick found no reasonable prospect that the complaint would succeed on the available evidence. The decision explains how language concerns can engage human rights protections, while requiring evidence of a discriminatory employment impact.
A screening decision on the available record
Faranak Moradi worked as a probationary employee in a Whole Foods prepared-foods department from November 2018 until January 2019. She alleged mistreatment by managers and co-workers, unfair performance reviews, a failure to accommodate and discriminatory termination.
Whole Foods denied discrimination and attributed the termination to repeated performance concerns. Its evidence included three reviews that identified a need for improvement in most or all assessed areas.
Moradi did not respond to the dismissal application despite receiving notice and an opportunity to do so. The tribunal considered her complaint and amendments, the employer’s response, and the employer’s evidence and arguments. Chapnick expressly made no findings of fact.
Under section 27(1)(c) of the Human Rights Code, an employer seeking dismissal must show that a complaint has no reasonable prospect of success. The tribunal described the evidentiary threshold for proceeding to a hearing as low but meaningful: a possibility of discrimination, without evidence taking the case beyond speculation, is not enough.
When language can be connected to discrimination
Moradi said English was not her first language and that she could not understand the written forms documenting her performance reviews because they had not been translated. She objected to signing documents she could not read and comprehend.
Chapnick explained that language is not a stand-alone protected characteristic under the Code. It can nevertheless support a discrimination complaint when connected to a protected characteristic such as race or ancestry.
For this application, the tribunal assumed without deciding that Moradi had a language-proficiency issue connected to race. It still found no reasonable prospect of proving an adverse employment impact from the untranslated forms.
The distinction turned on the evidence. Moradi did not allege that she had failed to understand the discussions during the reviews, or that language-related difficulties had caused the poor performance assessments. There was no evidence that translation had been denied to discriminate against her, and no employment consequences flowed from her refusal to sign.
The ruling therefore does not establish that employers never need to translate workplace documents. Its conclusion concerns the absence of evidence connecting the untranslated forms to an adverse employment impact in this case.
Other allegations also lacked the necessary connection
The tribunal found insufficient evidence linking the other alleged treatment to race. It acknowledged that mocking a racialized employee’s name can support a discrimination finding, depending on the circumstances, but found the contextual details supplied here inadequate.
It also found insufficient evidence linking a disability to the alleged adverse treatment or the performance problems underlying the termination. The record did not establish medical restrictions against working quickly or attending a review, or explain how the reported health conditions affected job performance. Because the disability case had no reasonable prospect of success, the tribunal did not need to assess whether Whole Foods could establish a defence.
The entire complaint was dismissed under section 27(1)(c). Although Whole Foods had also argued that some allegations were late, the tribunal resolved the application on the complaint’s prospects of success, not timeliness.
Source: British Columbia Human Rights Tribunal.
