Q: Are Discretionary Payments that are part of a union negotiation not discretionary?
Can you point me towards any more information on that specifically?
I’m particularly interested in when a payment is negotiated with the union within the 12 months of the last collective agreement expiring and prior to the new collective being agreed on.
Any thoughts or documentation you can send my way would be interesting.
A: It falls back on how it is created.
- It has been negotiated (formal process) – this is far more than an out-of-a-blue decision to pay a discretionary payment to an employee
- It would be part of the collective agreement (agreed by the parties)
- It has created an expectation as an agreed term that it will be paid
There is very little of anything discretionary about the above.