Ontario Employment Standards: Exemptions, Special Rules and Temporary Help Agencies

Ontario’s Employment Standards Act, 2000 (ESA) sets the floor for most working relationships in the province, but it does not apply the same way to every job. Its main exemption regulation, O. Reg. 285/01, removes named parts of the Act for certain occupations, raises the overtime threshold for some sectors, and sets special pay rules for others; a separate regulation handles the automobile sector’s rest hours; and the Act itself governs temporary help agencies, recruiters, and what a job posting must say. This page explains those carve-outs and special rules in plain language and links each one to the official source.

One idea governs everything below. These exemptions and special rules switch off only the named parts of the ESA they touch — and the ESA is itself only a floor, not a ceiling. An employee who is “exempt” from overtime or minimum wage usually keeps every other entitlement in the Act, and the ESA does not displace an employee’s civil claims: statutory minimums sit underneath common-law reasonable notice, which is usually far larger than the Act’s minimum on termination. Labelling someone exempt under a regulation is the start of the analysis, not the end of it.

Who does the ESA cover, and who falls outside it?

The ESA applies whenever an employee’s work is done in Ontario, or is done partly here and partly elsewhere as a continuation of Ontario work; it even binds the Crown, and a defined list of relationships — federally regulated work, certain listed individuals, directors, qualifying consultants, and foreign embassies — falls outside it.

Who counts as an “employee” is read broadly. The Act catches people who work for wages, people who supply services for wages, trainees being taught a skill the employer’s staff use (a trial period counts as training), and homeworkers. A company officer can be an employee too. When associated or related businesses are carried on through one or more entities, the Act treats all of them as a single employer — which matters for calculating entitlements and for joint-and-several liability.

The big carve-outs from coverage are:

• Federal jurisdiction. If the relationship falls under Parliament’s authority (banks, airlines, interprovincial transport, telecom and the like), the ESA does not apply. Those workers are governed by the federal Canada Labour Code instead.
• Listed individuals in section 3(5): secondary-school students in an authorized work-experience program; people in approved college or university placements; certain inmates and court-ordered work; police officers; holders of political, religious, judicial, or quasi-judicial office; and others.
• Directors and consultants. Directors are largely outside the Act except for liability and enforcement parts. A genuine business or IT consultant working through their own corporation or registered sole proprietorship, under a written deal paying at least $60 an hour, can also be exempt.
• Embassies and consulates of foreign nations.

Two bright lines trip employers up most. First, you cannot contract out of an employment standard — any waiver is void; only a term that gives a greater benefit overrides the minimum. Second, you cannot dodge the Act by labelling a true employee a “contractor”; misclassification does not move someone out of coverage.

Source: Employment Standards Act, 2000, ss. 1–12.

The statute is the floor, not the ceiling. The ESA does not displace an employee’s civil claims; statutory minimums sit underneath common-law reasonable notice, which is usually far larger than the Act’s minimum on termination.

Who is exempt from minimum wage, hours, overtime, public holidays and vacation?

Six parts of the Employment Standards Act — hours of work, eating periods, overtime, public holidays, minimum wage, and vacation with pay — do not apply to a defined list of occupations, including certain licensed professionals, commercial fishers, real-estate salespeople, away-from-office commission salespeople, and farm workers in primary production. If someone falls into one of the listed categories, those entitlements simply do not attach.

Who is on the list:

• Licensed professionals — architects, lawyers, engineers, public accountants, surveyors, and vets. Also duly registered practitioners of chiropody, chiropractic, dentistry, massage therapy, medicine, optometry, pharmacy, physiotherapy, and psychology, plus naturopaths registered under the Naturopathy Act, 2007. Teachers (as defined in the Teaching Profession Act) and students in training for any of these occupations are covered too.
• Commercial fishing, and salespeople or brokers under the Trust in Real Estate Services Act, 2002.
• Commission salespeople (not route salespeople) who are paid at least partly by commission on offers to purchase or sales that are normally made away from the employer’s place of business.
• Farm workers whose job is directly related to primary production — eggs, milk, grain, seeds, fruit, vegetables, maple products, honey, tobacco, herbs, pigs, cattle, sheep, goats, poultry, deer, elk, ratites, bison, rabbits, game birds, and cultured fish. This exemption is not total: sections 24, 25, 25.1, 26 and 27 of the regulation still apply to them.

The job title does not do the work. A worker called a “salesperson” or “professional” does not automatically qualify — the actual duties and compensation structure have to match the regulation. A salesperson on straight salary, or one who sells from the office, likely will not fit. And these carve-outs only remove the six listed parts; termination pay, leaves of absence, equal pay and the rest of the Act still apply in full. Whether a particular worker qualifies is fact-specific — verify the duties and pay structure before treating someone as exempt.

Source: When Work Deemed to be Performed, Exemptions and Special Rules (O. Reg. 285/01), s. 2.

Who is exempt from the hours-of-work limits and from overtime pay?

Ontario’s daily and weekly limits on hours (Part IX) and overtime pay after 44 hours in a week (Part VIII) do not apply to everyone — a long list of jobs is carved out by O. Reg. 285/01, and the two lists do not match perfectly, so the right list has to be checked for the right rule.

For overtime pay, the exempt jobs include:

• people whose work is genuinely supervisory or managerial (they can still do the odd front-line task on an irregular or one-off basis);
• firefighters, taxi drivers, ambulance drivers, ambulance helpers and first-aid attendants on an ambulance, and information technology professionals;
• hunting, fishing and wilderness guides;
• landscape gardeners and people who install and maintain swimming pools;
• certain farm and growing work — mushrooms, flowers, sod, trees and shrubs, horse breeding and boarding, and fur-bearing animals;
• students who instruct or supervise children, work at children’s camps, or staff a charity’s recreation program; and
• live-in superintendents, janitors and caretakers of a residential building.

The hours-of-work limits have a shorter exempt list, mainly the residential-building caretaker and several student roles — and note that a wilderness guide is not exempt there. The common error is assuming a fancy job title makes someone “management.” It does not — the test is the actual work, and misclassifying a worker as exempt can mean years of unpaid overtime owing. When in doubt, treat the person as covered and get advice.

Source: When Work Deemed to be Performed, Exemptions and Special Rules (O. Reg. 285/01), ss. 7–10.

The statute is the floor, not the ceiling. Overtime is purely a creature of statute. The ESA requires time-and-a-half after 44 hours a week, but the common law has no separate overtime entitlement at all — which is exactly why a regulation can switch it off for whole categories of workers. Outside the ESA’s rules, there is no fallback overtime right to fall back on.

What are the minimum-wage exemptions and special rules: room and board, and wilderness guides?

O. Reg. 285/01 carves certain roles out of the ESA’s hours-of-work part entirely, sets fixed dollar values for room-and-board credits, and gives wilderness guides their own day-rate structure rather than an hourly wage.

Who is exempt from Part VII (hours of work). The Act’s hours-of-work and rest provisions do not apply to: someone whose role is genuinely supervisory or managerial (performing non-managerial tasks on an irregular or exceptional basis is fine); a hunting or fishing guide, or a wilderness guide; a construction employee; a firefighter; a live-in superintendent, janitor, or caretaker of a residential building; and an embalmer or funeral director. Landscape gardeners and swimming-pool installers are out of the hours-of-work and exceptional-circumstances sections, but the daily rest requirement still applies to them. For certain agricultural operations — mushrooms, flowers, sod, nursery trees, horse breeding, and fur-bearing animals — along with IT professionals and workers in the recorded visual and audio-visual entertainment production industry, all of Part VII is removed. None of these exemptions touch the minimum-wage rules in Part IX, which remain in effect unless a separate provision applies.

Room and board credits. When an employer provides accommodation or meals, fixed amounts are deemed wages for minimum-wage purposes: $31.70 a week for a private room ($15.85 if not private), $2.55 per meal up to $53.55 a week, or $85.25 a week for private room and board combined ($69.40 if the room is not private). A room only qualifies if it is reasonably furnished and fit for human habitation, supplied with clean bed linen and towels, and reasonably accessible to toilet and wash-basin facilities. Room or board that the employee did not actually receive cannot be credited.

Wilderness guides receive a day rate rather than an hourly wage. The regulation set $75.00 for fewer than five consecutive hours and $150.05 for five or more hours (whether or not consecutive) for the period January 1 to September 30, 2022. From October 1, 2022 onward, the rate is determined by the indexing formula under s. 23.1(4) of the ESA — not those static figures. Because the guide day-rate is indexed and the general minimum wage changes, confirm the current figures against the government’s minimum-wage rates before relying on them. Common traps: treating a job title as proof of managerial status, or claiming a room-and-board credit for accommodation the employee never actually used.

Source: When Work Deemed to be Performed, Exemptions and Special Rules (O. Reg. 285/01), ss. 4–6.

What overtime thresholds apply to construction and transport workers?

Certain construction and transport jobs reach overtime later than the standard 44 hours: road building for streets, highways or parking lots at 55 hours; road-building structures, sewer and watermain work, and local cartage at 50 hours; and qualifying highway-transport truck drivers at 60 hours. The overtime rate is still 1.5 times the regular rate once the threshold is passed.

Where each job sits:

• Road building for streets, highways or parking lots: overtime after 55 hours a week.
• Road building structures like bridges, tunnels or retaining walls tied to streets or highways: overtime after 50 hours.
• Sewer and watermain work — laying, altering, repairing, maintaining, related work, or guarding the site: overtime after 50 hours.
• Local cartage — drivers and drivers’ helpers carrying goods for hire within a municipality or up to 5 km beyond its limits: overtime after 50 hours.
• Highway transport — drivers of qualifying trucks (broadly, trucks that would have needed an operating licence under the old Truck Transportation Act): overtime after 60 hours.

Two wrinkles apply to road building. If a worker puts in fewer hours than the threshold in a week, the shortfall — up to 22 hours — can be carried forward and added to next week’s threshold. And for highway-transport drivers, only the hours when the driver is directly responsible for the truck count toward the total. The local cartage and highway transport rules do not overlap: a local cartage driver follows the 50-hour rule, not the 60. When the work does not fit one of these defined categories, the ordinary 44-hour rule comes back.

Source: When Work Deemed to be Performed, Exemptions and Special Rules (O. Reg. 285/01), ss. 13–18.

Which hospitality and fresh fruit/vegetable processing workers earn overtime only after 50 hours?

Two seasonal groups reach the overtime threshold at 50 hours instead of the standard 44: hospitality workers who work 24 weeks or fewer in the calendar year and are provided room and board, and seasonal workers directly tied to processing fresh fruits or vegetables by the canner or processor itself.

Hotels, motels, tourist resorts, restaurants and taverns. An employee at one of these establishments reaches the 50-hour overtime threshold only when both conditions apply: they work 24 weeks or fewer in the calendar year, and the employer provides them with room and board. Both requirements must be met. If either is absent — the person works beyond 24 weeks, or no lodging and meals are provided — the standard 44-hour rule applies. A permanent, year-round server who commutes from home does not qualify.

Fresh fruit and vegetable processing. A seasonal worker qualifies for the 50-hour threshold when their role is directly tied to canning, processing, or packing fresh fruits or vegetables — or to distributing those products, but only where the distributor is the same canner or processor who made them. A third-party distributor’s workers would not qualify, and a permanent office employee at the same facility falls under the ordinary rules. The 50-hour rule is an individual exemption that depends on each worker’s circumstances, not a company-wide entitlement that flows from being a restaurant or a cannery; misclassifying someone who belongs at 44 hours can result in unpaid overtime owing.

Source: When Work Deemed to be Performed, Exemptions and Special Rules (O. Reg. 285/01), ss. 14–15.

How does the minimum-wage floor and quarterly reconciliation work for commission auto sales?

Where car salespeople are paid partly or fully on commission, every pay period must clear at least what they would have earned at minimum wage, and pay is reconciled against earnings each calendar quarter without carrying a shortfall forward.

The pay-period floor. For each pay period, the employer must pay each salesperson at least what they would have earned at minimum wage for the hours worked. Commission can be on top of that, but it can never bring the cheque below the minimum-wage amount. A pay period can run no longer than one month.

Quarterly reconciliation. On top of the per-period floor, the employer reconciles what was actually paid against what the person earned over fixed reconciliation periods — the four calendar quarters: January–March, April–June, July–September, and October–December. The reconciliation trues up commissions against the minimum-wage floor, and it can never leave anyone below minimum wage for any pay period.

No carry-forward. A balance cannot be pushed past the end of a reconciliation period. Each quarter stands on its own.

When someone leaves mid-quarter. If employment ends before a reconciliation period closes, the payments are still reconciled against what the person earned up to that point, and the minimum-wage floor still applies. A common error is treating a slow month as the salesperson’s problem: a dry stretch with little commission still has to clear minimum wage every pay period, and a big month later in the quarter cannot be borrowed against to cover it.

Source: When Work Deemed to be Performed, Exemptions and Special Rules (O. Reg. 285/01), s. 28.

What special pay and rest rules apply to domestic workers and residential care workers?

Domestic workers must get written terms before starting and only limited room-and-board credit toward minimum wage, while residential care workers have a guaranteed day-rate, pay for up to three extra hours, a 36-hour weekly rest requirement, and — where they live in the home — an exemption from the hours-of-work and overtime rules.

Domestic workers. Someone employed as a domestic worker in a private home must be given the basics in writing before they start: their regular hours (start and finish times) and their hourly rate. If the employer also provides room or board, only fixed amounts count toward the minimum wage owed:

• Private room: $31.70 a week; a shared (non-private) room: nothing.
• Board: $2.55 a meal, no more than $53.55 a week total.
• Room and board combined: $85.25 a week for a private room, $53.55 for a shared one.

The room credit only applies if the space is reasonably furnished, fit for habitation, stocked with clean bed linen and towels, and within reasonable reach of a toilet and wash-basin. The board or room credit cannot be claimed unless the worker actually ate those meals or occupied that room.

Residential care workers. A “day” here means the 24-hour stretch from midnight to midnight. For each day of work, the employer owes a minimum of 12 hours’ pay at the worker’s regular rate, which cannot fall below minimum wage. If the worker has arranged to be off normal duties for part of the day and ends up working fewer than 12 hours, the employer pays for the hours actually worked rather than the full 12. On top of the base day-rate, the worker is owed their regular rate for up to three additional hours beyond 12 in that day — but only when the worker keeps an accurate daily record and delivers it to the employer no later than the first pay day after the pay day covering that pay period. Every work week, residential care workers are entitled to at least 36 consecutive hours free from duties, or a different arrangement they agree to; if they consent to work during those free hours at the employer’s request, the employer must either carry that hour forward into one of the next eight 36-hour rest periods, or pay at least time-and-a-half for it.

Where a residential care worker lives in the home where they care for people, the ESA’s hours-of-work and eating-period rules and its overtime-pay rules simply do not apply to them, and the requirement to keep a record of daily and weekly hours worked is also lifted. Everything else in the Act still applies — that carve-out is only about hours and overtime. Common traps: neglecting the written terms for domestic workers, counting a shared room toward the wage offset, or failing to collect the daily time records that entitle a residential care worker to pay for those extra hours beyond the 12-hour floor.

Source: When Work Deemed to be Performed, Exemptions and Special Rules (O. Reg. 285/01), ss. 19–27.

What special ESA rules apply to harvest workers?

Employees harvesting fruit, vegetables or tobacco for marketing or storage get their own special-rule package: a minimum-wage floor (piece-work counts if the rate is realistic), room-and-board credits only where the housing genuinely qualifies, the three-hour rule for short shifts, and — after 13 weeks — vacation and public-holiday entitlements.

The harvest-worker minimums are:

• Minimum wage. Each pay period they must earn at least what they would have made at minimum wage. A piece-work rate counts as long as it is the rate generally recognized locally as one a reasonably diligent worker could hit minimum wage on.
• Room and board. If the employer houses or feeds them, set amounts can be credited toward wages — but only if the accommodation genuinely meets the standards (fit to live in, proper facilities), and only for meals actually eaten and rooms actually used.
• Three-hour rule. The ESA’s minimum-pay-for-short-shifts rule applies.
• Vacation. After 13 weeks of employment, vacation or vacation pay kicks in, earned right back to their first day.
• Public holidays. After 13 weeks, the public-holiday rules apply, and they are treated as working in a continuous operation.

A common error is claiming room-and-board credits when the housing does not actually meet the conditions, or assuming the residential-care exemption strips away vacation and holiday rights — it does not.

Source: When Work Deemed to be Performed, Exemptions and Special Rules (O. Reg. 285/01), ss. 23–27.

What special rules apply to homemakers and homeworkers?

The exemption regulation caps a homemaker’s paid minimum-wage hours at 12 a day (which lifts the hours-of-work, overtime and hours-records rules), and requires an employer to give a homeworker written notice of the work and how they will be paid before the work starts. The two names sound alike but describe different arrangements.

Homemakers. A homemaker is someone hired to do homemaking services in a householder’s private home, but employed by someone other than that householder — think a worker placed through an agency rather than hired directly by the family. For this group, the hours that have to be paid at least minimum wage are capped at 12 in a day. When a homemaker is paid on that basis, three things drop away: the hours-of-work and eating-period rules, overtime pay, and the requirement to keep a record of hours worked.

Homeworkers. A homeworker is a different role — someone doing work from home for an employer. The rule here is about clarity up front, in writing. Before the work starts, the employer must tell the homeworker, in writing, what they are being employed to do and how they will be paid: an hourly amount for a regular work week, an amount per article or thing made, or whatever other basis applies. “Manufacture” is read broadly here — it covers preparing, improving, repairing, altering, assembling or completing things, not just building from scratch. If pay is by the piece and a deadline is set for a certain quantity, that deadline also has to be put in writing.

Where people get burned: assuming the 12-hour homemaker carve-out covers ordinary employees who happen to work from home (it does not), or hiring a homeworker on a casual handshake and never papering the pay basis.

Source: When Work Deemed to be Performed, Exemptions and Special Rules (O. Reg. 285/01), ss. 11–12.

When are home-care assignment employees carved out of the job-protected leaves?

Part XVIII.1 of the ESA — the job-protected leaves like pregnancy, parental, sick, and family responsibility — does not apply to an assignment employee assigned to provide professional, personal support, homemaking, or care co-ordination services, where the assignment runs under a contract between a Service Organization and either the worker directly or the worker’s employer. It is a tightly drawn exception, not a general escape hatch.

The exemption applies to an assignment employee — someone placed with a client through an agency-style arrangement — who is assigned to provide one of four kinds of work tied to the home and community care system: professional services; personal support services; homemaking services; or care co-ordination services. The carve-out only bites when the assignment is made under a contract with a Service Organization under the Connecting Care Act, 2019. The contract can run either way: directly between the worker and the Service Organization, or between the worker’s own employer and the Service Organization. The four service categories take their meaning from the Home and Community Care Services regulation (O. Reg. 187/22), so this is not a free-floating label — it is anchored to that specific system.

The trap is assuming “home care” or “caregiver” automatically removes someone from the leave rules. It does not. If the assignment is not under a Service Organization contract, or the worker is a regular employee rather than an assignment employee on one of these four service types, the ordinary Part XVIII.1 leaves still apply. Arrangements that do not clearly fit all three elements — assignment employee, qualifying service type, Service Organization contract — remain subject to the full leave rules.

Source: When Work Deemed to be Performed, Exemptions and Special Rules (O. Reg. 285/01), s. 10.1.

Are old overtime-averaging agreements and pre-2001 long-shift arrangements still in force?

Yes — two old rules still bind employers who think every hours-of-work deal can be torn up at will. An overtime/hours agreement made at hiring and approved by the Director can only be cancelled if both sides agree, and certain pre-September 4, 2001 long-shift arrangements remain exempt from the standard daily hours cap.

Approved agreements locked in at hiring. Normally an employee can back out of an hours or overtime agreement on reasonable notice. But if the agreement was made when the person was hired and the Director of Employment Standards approved it, the regulation makes it a one-way street: it stays in force unless both the employer and the employee agree to scrap it. The Director can also attach conditions when granting that approval. Neither side gets to walk away alone from one of these grandfathered, approved arrangements.

Pre-September 4, 2001 long-shift arrangements. The ESA’s general cap on daily hours does not apply to a group of employees who each have an arrangement with an employer that held a permit issued under section 18 of the Employment Standards Act, and are not asked to work more than 10 hours in a day. The arrangement has to say the employee is willing to work extra hours on request, must have been made at or before hiring and before September 4, 2001, and must not have been cancelled by mutual agreement. It does not have to be in writing. Where people get burned: assuming a handshake long-shift deal from decades ago is gone — if the chain is unbroken and the 10-hour ceiling is respected, it can still stand. Confirm the history before relying on it.

Source: When Work Deemed to be Performed, Exemptions and Special Rules (O. Reg. 285/01), ss. 1–33.

What does the auto-sector rest regulation (O. Reg. 502/06) require?

O. Reg. 502/06 is a narrow ESA regulation for the automobile sector that lets an employer and employee agree to a daily rest rule of at least 11 hours free from work, with one shorter day a week of no less than 8 consecutive hours. If a business is not in one of the defined automobile industries, this regulation is not its concern.

The regulation applies only to a handful of automobile-sector industries it calls the “defined industries”: building automobiles, making auto parts, warehousing those parts, and the marshalling — the staging and delivery — of finished vehicles. Who it reaches is just as narrow: employees in those industries who are either hands-on in the listed activities or whose presence at the workplace is needed for that work, plus the employers of those people.

The duty most likely to matter day to day is the daily rest rule. Where the employer and the employee agree, a custom rest schedule replaces the ESA’s usual standard:

• Most days, give the employee at least 11 hours in a row free from work.
• On one day each work week, that free stretch can be shorter, but never less than 8 consecutive hours.

Source: Terms and Conditions of Employment in Defined Industries (O. Reg. 502/06), ss. 2–3.

What rules govern temporary help agencies and recruiters: licensing, assignment-employee rights and joint liability?

In Ontario, temporary help agencies and recruiters must hold a licence from the Director of Employment Standards before operating, agencies cannot charge most fees to assignment employees, and an agency and its client share joint and several liability for unpaid wages in any pay period in which the worker was assigned to that client.

Licensing. A temporary help agency or recruiter needs a licence from the Director before opening for business. Clients cannot knowingly use an unlicensed temporary help agency, and employers or prospective employers cannot knowingly use an unlicensed recruiter. Licences are non-transferable and expire after one year (unless a longer period is prescribed). The Director keeps a public website listing every active licensee — with the issue and expiry dates — plus every licence that has been revoked or suspended. If the Director refuses an application or revokes a licence, the applicant can apply to the Ontario Labour Relations Board for a review within 30 days of receiving notice, and in most cases cannot reapply to the Director for at least two years unless they bring new evidence. A suspension, rather than a full revocation, does not trigger the two-year bar.

The agency is the employer. When an agency agrees to assign someone to work for clients, the agency is the employer, which creates real obligations:

• No fees to workers. Agencies cannot charge an assignment employee for getting taken on, getting placed, resume or interview coaching, or for being hired directly by a client. They also cannot prevent a client from hiring the worker. An agency may charge a client a placement fee, but only during the six-month window beginning on the date the worker first performed work for that client.
• Information up front. The agency must provide workers with its legal name and contact details, the Director’s published rights document, and written details of each assignment — including the wage rate, hours, and estimated duration.
• Ending an assignment early. Where an assignment was offered with an estimated term of at least three months and is cut short before that term expires, the agency must give the worker one week’s written notice or pay in lieu. This obligation falls away if the agency offers a comparable replacement assignment during the notice period, or if an exception applies — such as wilful misconduct by the worker, a force-majeure event, or a strike or lockout at the assignment location.

Joint liability for the client. If the agency fails to pay regular wages, overtime, public holiday pay, or premium pay for a pay period in which a worker was assigned to that client, both the agency and the client are on the hook together — even though the agency is primarily responsible. Reprisal against assignment employees is prohibited, and in any proceeding the client bears the burden of proving it did not retaliate. (Recruiting workers from abroad carries its own licensing and protection regime under the Employment Protection for Foreign Nationals Act.)

Source: Employment Standards Act, 2000, ss. 74.1–74.19.

The statute is the floor, not the ceiling. The ESA sets minimum notice and severance entitlements for assignment employees, calculated using a 12-week average wage formula that differs from the standard ESA calculation. Common law reasonable notice for assignment employees can be substantially longer than these ESA minimums, and courts assess it based on the same Bardal factors (age, length of service, character of employment, availability of similar work) applied to the overall agency employment relationship — not just the individual assignment. Whether an agency’s refusal to assign work constitutes constructive dismissal at common law is a live question that turns on the specific facts.

What must an Ontario job posting include: salary ranges, AI disclosure and the Canadian-experience ban?

For a publicly advertised job posting an employer must state the expected compensation or a range, disclose if artificial intelligence is used to screen, assess or select applicants, say whether the posting is for an existing vacancy, and drop any Canadian-experience requirement from the posting and the application form. These rules reach “prospective” employers too, so they bite before anyone is hired.

For a publicly advertised job posting, the employer must:

• Show the pay. State the expected compensation, or a range for it. This particular pay-range rule is on the books but scheduled to be repealed on a date set by proclamation, so watch for the change.
• Disclose AI screening. If artificial intelligence is used to screen, assess, or select applicants, the posting has to say so.
• Say if it is a real opening. State whether the posting is for an existing vacancy or not.
• Drop Canadian-experience requirements. The posting and the application form cannot ask for Canadian experience.

There is also a back-end duty: if an applicant is interviewed for the role, the employer must give them certain prescribed information within a set time. And job-posting platforms — not employers’ own career pages — must offer a way to report fake listings and publish a written policy on handling them. Nearly every one of these rules carries an exception “as may be prescribed” — the fine print lives in the regulations, including what counts as a “publicly advertised job posting” and how a pay range may be expressed. Common traps: assuming an internal or single-company career page is a covered “platform” (it is not), or forgetting the AI line when a vendor’s resume-screening tool is doing the first cut. Check the current regulations before finalizing a posting.

Source: Employment Standards Act, 2000, ss. 8.1–8.7.

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This page is general information about Ontario employment law, not legal advice. Whether a particular worker qualifies for an exemption or special rule is fact-specific and turns on the duties, pay structure and circumstances, so confirm your facts — and the current regulations — before you rely on an exemption.