Recruiting companies display themselves without embarrassment

“Must be incorporated” and “payment only to incorporated companies”… Transport companies do not hesitate to express their preference for “inc. drivers.” » when they recruit online, observed The Press. Described as a scourge by the industry, this model allows companies to avoid paying certain taxes and offer services at a discount.

Simple visits to sites like Kijiji and Indeed reveal that most of the job offers posted include a specific mention of the need for the candidate to be “incorporated”, even if it is a a full-time position where the candidate is not asked to own their equipment.

The Press played the role of a driver looking for a living.

“We have two [chauffeurs] who are on the payroll [la masse salariale] and everyone else is incorporated, it’s much simpler for us,” explains Isa lleri, identified as the contact person at Ilco Transit in a job offer posted on Kijiji a little over a year ago. week.

In its offer, the company clearly indicates offering 74 cents per “mile” traveled to an incorporated driver. During the conversation, Mr. Ileri will specify that the remuneration is approximately “63-64 cents” per mile for a fully-fledged salaried employee.

Informed of the procedures The Press during a second call, the latter qualified his remarks.

Ilco also provided further explanations by email. The company cited a “gray area” in employee classification in the industry. Its accounting director, Hazar Baran, says Ilco offers remuneration to its independent drivers that means the company had “no advantage in having” an independent employee rather than a formal employee . Transport companies which respect the current framework do not agree (see other text).

Misclassification

In the industry, “incorporated drivers” don’t need any introductions. They do not own any equipment and only sell their services to a single client. These are not tow valet operators, who are, for example, owners of a tractor. The latter are entrepreneurs and self-employed workers in the eyes of the tax authorities.

This practice denounced by the industry allows the offending company using the model to make significant savings. The client does not have to pay social security contributions, such as those for the Quebec Pension Plan and employment insurance.

In other words, it does not pay benefits or provide basic labor protections. In exchange, the hourly or mileage rate offered by the company is generally a little higher.

Cool ALTS Transport, which operates four tractors, according to its owner, filled its posted position within days of the initial call from The Press.

Why incorporated drivers?

“It was my accountant who told me to hire [de cette façon]replies Julio Sabosan Sathiaseelan, of Cool ALTS Transport, when The Press identifies himself by asking him why he was recruiting incorporated drivers. I’m going to talk to my accountant and I’m going to try to find out a little more in detail, too. My accountant told me to hire like this, it will be easier. »

The owner of four tractors later ended the call.

This increasingly widespread model is strongly criticized by the Quebec Trucking Association (ACQ) and its counterparts in the rest of the country. They cry unfair competition, arguing that this stratagem allows companies to make significant savings and to bid aggressively on calls for tenders, which harms carriers who respect the rules in force. Major industry players like TFI International and Groupe Robert can’t take it anymore (see other text).

For their part, these so-called entrepreneurs who work for a single company and have no control over their schedules find themselves in a risky situation. They do not benefit from rights such as workers’ compensation, overtime, paid leave and parental leave. According to the ACQ, temporary workers are particularly vulnerable because they do not know all the rules of the tax framework in force as well as the benefits of the social safety net.

According to the Quebec Trucking Association (ACQ), which prepared models in collaboration with the Cain Lamarre firm, some 2 billion in contributions of all kinds have escaped the Quebec state due to the “incorporated driver” model for approximately a decade.

Read “Up to 2 billion escaped the State”

Hybrid recruiting

Elsewhere in the industry, we seem to be playing both sides. In its announcement on Kijiji, National Transport specifies that the candidate “must be incorporated”. On the other end of the line, operations manager Sunny Sanghera is less sharp.

“You can get on the payroll,” he said, during the initial conversation with The Press. More and more, it’s payroll. »

During the follow-up call, Mr. Sanghera asserts that “many drivers who work in the city are incorporated” adding that it is the latter who ask to be paid this way.

“They work here for two months, after that they go to another place,” he said. When a driver stays longer, we change them to put them on the payroll. »

Informed of the large-scale dissemination of job offers specifying that they were looking for “incorporated drivers”, the ACQ did not hide its astonishment.

Last December, the latter received a letter from the Minister of Labor, Jean Boulet, which indicated that the Legault government’s “reflection” “on the subject of this stratagem” was progressing. This analysis is continuing in order to determine “what would be the best way to modify the legislative framework”, indicated the Ministry, by email, to a question intended to know where the government’s “thinking” was.

The 2023 federal budget provided funding to amend the Canada Labor Code to improve job protections for federally regulated workers by strengthening prohibitions on employee misclassification. This change is still awaited. Last fall, the Canada Revenue Agency deployed the second part of an awareness campaign on the theme of employee classification.

Not surprisingly, this is considered insufficient by the trucking industry.