No severance for laid-off Ben Moss employees — but pizza lunches for remaining staff

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This article was published 06/08/2016 (3538 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Several former Ben Moss Jewellers employees have filed complaints with the Manitoba Labour Board, saying they were laid off suddenly Tuesday with no warning or severance — even though some had been with the Winnipeg-based company for almost 40 years.

Vera Sime, who worked as an accounts payable clerk for just under three years, said employees at company headquarters at 201 Portage Avenue were told July 29 by management not to worry about losing their jobs after the company was purchased at a bankruptcy auction by Gordon Brothers Group, a liquidation firm.

Gordon Brothers Canada announced July 29 that going-out-of-business sales would begin at all 54 Ben Moss locations across Canada, including five in Manitoba.

The business has been Canadian-owned and operated since 1910. The company sought creditor protection in May to undertake a restructuring. Gordon Brothers Canada was hired to oversee the closure of 11 of their underperforming stores.

Still, Sime said staff at Winnipeg headquarters were reassured employees would remain until December as the company wound down operations.

But Tuesday, after the long weekend, at least 27 of 51 employees at head office were notified their jobs had been terminated.

Four employees interviewed by the Free Press said they were told they would be paid until the end of Tuesday, plus holiday time owed, but no severance package was offered.

“I was blindsided because I wasn’t expecting it that soon,” said Sime, 55. “I didn’t see it coming. I was in shock.”

One of the employees, who was on disability while being treated for breast cancer, was laid off by phone.

“That’s what really got me angry, what they did to her,” said Sime, who filed a complaint with the labour board Thursday. “It wasn’t so much me as what they did to the others.

“For me, it’s a matter of principle,” Sime added. “You can’t treat people like this. It’s wrong. It’s cheating people out of what they deserve.

“At this point, we’re just lines on a spreadsheet.”

Sime noted an employee on maternity leave was laid off. Several others were on vacation.

‘I was blindsided because I wasn’t expecting it that soon. I didn’t see it coming. I was in shock’– former Ben Moss employee Vera Sime 

A request for an interview with Brent Trepel at the Ben Moss head office was not responded to. Trepel, whose family had owned Ben Moss Jewellers for several decades until it was sold to JSN three years ago, has remained involved in the management of the company.

The company’s four Manitoba stores (three in Winnipeg, one in Brandon) remain open.

Manitoba’s employment standards branch requires employers to give workers notice or pay in lieu of notice on a scale relative to the employees’ length of employment. A worker with at least 30 days but less than a year’s employment must receive one week’s notice, an employee with one to three years of tenure must receive two weeks, increasing to eight weeks’ notice for more than 10 years of employment.

The former employee who is receiving chemo for breast cancer told the Free Press she is on disability until late September or early October. The 63-year-old, who didn’t want to be identified, worked for Ben Moss for more than five years and planned to return to work.

“I was stunned,” said the woman, who wanted to remain anonymous, of the termination phone call. “I just went silent. They had to ask if I was still there. I was in shock mode.”

The woman, who worked in accounting, plans to file a claim to the labour board for lack of severance.

Another employee, who didn’t want to be named, fears that even if complaints are filed to the labour board, the employees will be shut out due to the bankruptcy.

“They know that by the time it goes through the courts, they’ll bankrupt the payroll and won’t be liable to pay creditors or employees,” he reasoned. “Basically, no one gets anything. It seems like that was the plan all along.”

Another employee who worked in marketing said employees who were laid off aren’t the only ones feeling shortchanged. In the last year, the employee said dozens of vendors, photographers and artists were demanding to be paid for their work.

The company stopped responding to those requests months ago.

“The way it was handled was awful,” the employee said, adding hundreds of customers had inquired about service warrantees they had purchased, which are mostly sold with engagement or wedding rings. “There was no remorse. Nothing. We were disgusted.”

Under a service agreement, a customer pays as much as several hundred dollars upfront for long-term repairs.

On the morning of the terminations, the head office had received 200 emails from customers asking about the fate of their warrantees. There was no one left to respond, the former employee said.

Terminated employees were infuriated after receiving a company email — after they were let go — announcing remaining staff could dress in casual attire, and pizza lunches would be supplied by management.

One of the former employees was frustrated that any cost of severance for employees would be a fraction of millions of dollars being spent to purchase and liquidate the company.

“But to the people buying cancer pills and going through this stuff, it’s big,” he said.