Document Details

Denny's Restaurants, the iconic North American all night diner famous for its Grand Slam breakfast, is at the centre of a multi-million dollar class action suit filed in Vancouver earlier this month on behalf of more than 50 foreign workers brought to Canada from the Philippines.
The suit alleges that recruitment agents acting for the Canadian firm Northland Property Corporation (which is the exclusive western Canadian franchisee for the U.S.-based Denny's Corporation) charged workers up to $6,000 each for placing them in the Canadian jobs and required them to pay for their own transportation costs to and from the Philippines. Both expenses, the suit claims, should have been borne by the employer.

The workers also say they have not always received the 40 hours of paid work each week they were promised. On the other hand, the filing claims, when these workers are required to put in overtime, they are not paid the legally required higher rate. The class action document also claims that Denny's workers who complained about paying recruitment and travel fees or who questioned why they were not receiving the full weekly shifts and proper overtime pay they had been promised were threatened with punitive job loss and being sent back home.