Do Part-Time and Casual Employees Get Severance in Ontario?
Part-time and casual status does not strip you of severance. If you are an employee, you have the same core rights, and how much you are owed depends on service, not job title.
Key takeaways
- Part-time and casual employees are still employees with full ESA rights.
- There is no severance exemption for being part-time or casual.
- Notice depends on length of service and other factors, not your title.
- Truly irregular work can complicate the analysis, but rarely erases it.
- Do not accept that casual means no rights; it usually is not true.
In this article
A lot of part-time and casual workers assume severance is only for full-time employees. It is a common and costly misconception. In Ontario, what matters is whether you are an employee, not how many hours you worked or what your schedule was called. Here is what part-time and casual employees are actually owed when they are let go.
✅Quick answer. Part-time and casual employees have the same core rights as full-time employees. There is no exemption from termination or severance based on part-time or casual status. If you are let go without cause, you are generally entitled to ESA termination pay and, where it applies, statutory severance, plus common-law reasonable notice. How much turns on your length of service, age, and role, not on the label part-time or casual. Genuinely sporadic, on-call work can complicate the math, but it rarely wipes out your entitlement.
Part-time and casual workers are employees
The Employment Standards Act protects employees regardless of how many hours they work. There is no rule that says you must be full-time to be covered. So part-time and most casual workers are entitled to the ESA basics, including notice or termination pay when they are let go without cause, on the same sliding scale by length of service that applies to everyone else.
Common-law notice applies too
Beyond the ESA minimum, part-time employees can also be entitled to common-law reasonable notice, which is usually larger. Courts assess the same factors as for full-time employees: length of service, age, the nature of the role, and how hard it is to find comparable work. A long-serving part-time employee can be owed a meaningful notice period, calculated on their actual earnings.
Where casual status can complicate things
The one area that needs care is genuinely casual, on-call work with no guaranteed hours and long gaps. There the questions can be whether an employment relationship continued between assignments and how to measure the loss. But being called casual by your employer does not settle it; if in reality you worked regularly and were treated as part of the workforce, you likely have full entitlements. The label is not the test.
What should you do if you are let go?
- 1.Do not accept that part-time or casual status means no severance.
- 2.Gather your record of hours and earnings to show the real pattern of work.
- 3.Add up your ESA minimum first, then consider common-law notice on top.
- 4.Get the offer or dismissal reviewed, since employers often understate what part-time staff are owed.
Your hours do not define your rights. See severance pay in Ontario and how much severance you are really owed, and if you were told part-timers get nothing, a severance review will set the record straight.
Frequently asked questions
Do part-time employees get severance in Ontario?
Yes. There is no severance exemption for part-time status. If you are let go without cause, you are generally owed ESA termination pay and, where applicable, statutory severance, plus common-law reasonable notice based on your service, age, and role.
What about casual or on-call workers?
Casual workers are usually employees with the same core rights. Genuinely sporadic, no-guaranteed-hours work can complicate how the loss is measured, but being labelled casual does not by itself remove your entitlement, especially if you worked regularly.
Is my severance smaller because I was part-time?
Your notice period is assessed on the same factors as anyone else, and the amount is calculated on your actual earnings. Part-time status affects the dollar figure through your pay, not by cutting your right to notice.
My employer says part-timers do not get severance. Is that true?
Almost always no. That is a common misconception. Part-time and casual employees have the same core ESA and common-law rights, so it is worth getting any such claim reviewed before you accept it.
Marcus Bello
Legal Writer, Mirza Law
Marcus Bello is a legal writer at Mirza Law in Toronto.
See all articles
