Woman who says her employer docked pay for washroom breaks will have human rights hearing
(The Star Television)

A southwestern Ontario woman is challenging her employer at a human rights tribunal hearing after she says her pay was docked because of washroom breaks she needs for her disability.Laurie Bates filed the complaint against Presstran Industries, a St. Thomas-based subsidiary of auto parts manufacturer Magna International, claiming her supervisors embarrassed her and docked her wages because she has irritable bowel syndrome. “I just felt as if I was being made a mockery of,” Bates told the Star in an interview.Bates, 58, claims the company installed a timer to record how long she left her work station for a washroom break. She also had to activate a device that showed everyone in the plant her station number and the words “on break.”Reached by email, Magna International spokesperson Scott Worden declined to comment on the case. But in a response filed to the tribunal, Presstran said it “takes a proactive approach to ensuring that its employees are not harassed or discriminated against on the basis of disability or any ground.”Presstran claims Bates’s washroom breaks caused her to miss production targets, which “has resulted (in) increased costs to the company.”It also says paying Bates for time spent in the washroom outside of her scheduled breaks “would constitute undue hardship” and would “confer a benefit on the applicant that would not be available to other Presstran employees.”The complaint is scheduled to be heard at the Ontario Human Rights Tribunal in January.In more than two decades at Presstran, Bates had worked in the cafeteria, in the office and as a forklift driver before she moved to the factory floor in August 2014. She said she did not disclose her condition to the company until June 2015 because it had never been an issue. Bates said she met with her supervisor and a human resources representative in December 2015. “They said they understand that I need accommodati ...