The letter arrived while you were still off work. Or the shifts quietly stopped being offered. Either way you are lying awake wondering whether you have any ground to stand on.
An Ontario employer can dismiss you while a WSIB claim is open, but where a re-employment obligation applies, a dismissal connected to the injury is a breach that carries a financial penalty. That obligation applies only when three conditions are all met. You were unable to work because of the work-related injury, you had been continuously employed by that employer for at least one year before the date of injury, and the employer regularly employs 20 or more workers. If you are terminated within six months of being re-employed while the obligation is still running, the WSIB presumes your employer has breached it.
A re-employment obligation is a statutory duty under section 41 of the Workplace Safety and Insurance Act requiring your employer to take you back. It sits on top of the ordinary duty to accommodate, and it is enforced by the WSIB rather than by a court.
When does the WSIB re-employment obligation apply?
All three conditions must be satisfied. Missing one removes the obligation entirely, which is why so many workers are surprised by the answer.
You were unable to work. This is broader than being off entirely. You count as unable to work if you were absent, if you worked less than your regular hours or if you needed accommodated work that pays less than your regular pay. Losing time only to attend a health care appointment does not count.
You had one year of continuous employment before the injury. Certain breaks do not reset the clock. Strikes and lock-outs, sick leave, parental leave, other leaves of absence, vacation, time off from a previous work injury and layoffs of less than three months where both sides intended you to return, all generally preserve continuous employment.
Your employer regularly employs 20 or more workers. Usually measured on the date of injury. Where a business has several sites, only workers whose earnings are reported to the Ontario WSIB count toward the total.
Temporary agency workers are covered where you were continuously on the agency placement roster for at least 12 months before the injury. You do not need to have been on assignment the whole time.
How long does the re-employment obligation last?
Until the earliest of three dates, whichever arrives first.
- Two years from the date of injury
- One year after you are medically able to perform the essential duties of your pre-injury work
- The date you turn 65
The earliest applicable date can move if your condition improves or deteriorates. On a fixed term contract, the obligation generally runs only to the end of the contract the injury interrupted, unless your employer had routinely renewed it without a break.
What must your employer actually offer you?
It depends on what you are medically able to do, and the obligation starts when your employer receives notice of that. Notice can come from you, from your treating health professional or from the WSIB.
If you are able to perform the essential duties of your pre-injury job, with or without accommodation, your employer must offer you that job back or an alternate job comparable in nature and earnings.
If you are able to perform suitable work but not your old job, your employer must give you the first opportunity at suitable work that becomes available.
The obligation is ongoing rather than a single offer. Every time a job closer to your pre-injury work becomes available during the obligation period, your employer must offer it.
What happens if your employer breaches the obligation?
This is where the numbers matter.
If you are terminated within six months of being re-employed while the obligation is still in effect, the WSIB presumes non-compliance. Your employer can rebut that presumption by showing the termination had nothing to do with the injury, the absences, the treatment or the claim itself.
You have three months to ask the WSIB to investigate. After three months the WSIB is not required to investigate, although it may choose to, and it can open an investigation on its own at any time. Ask early.
The penalty on an employer is generally the amount of your actual net average earnings for the year before the injury, and it is not capped by the ceiling that limits loss of earnings benefits. It takes effect 10 calendar days after written notice. It can be reduced by 50% if the employer then offers suitable work at no wage loss or by 25% if the suitable work comes with a wage loss.
You may also be paid directly. Where you are fit for your pre-injury job without accommodation and your employer refuses to take you back, the WSIB can issue re-employment payments equal to 85% of your pre-injury net average earnings, running from the date of the breach for up to one year or until the obligation ends. Where you are fit only for accommodated or suitable work and your employer fails to comply, loss of earnings benefits are paid instead.
Who is not covered by the re-employment obligation?
Several groups, and it is better to know now than to discover it later.
Construction workers employed by construction employers fall under a separate set of rules in Ontario Regulation 35/08 rather than under this policy. Workers with less than one year of continuous service are outside it. Workers at businesses with fewer than 20 employees are outside it. Where a business is sold to a genuinely different legal entity, the obligation generally does not follow.
The WSIB also does not usually levy a penalty where a termination had nothing to do with the injury, such as a genuine restructuring that would have removed the role regardless.
One thing survives all of those exclusions. The Ontario Human Rights Code treats a workplace injury as a disability, and your employer must accommodate you to the point of undue hardship regardless of how many people they employ or how long you worked there. That duty is entirely separate from the WSIB. Time limits apply to a human rights application, so raise it early rather than after the WSIB process finishes.
What are you allowed to do if your job is at risk during a WSIB claim?
You are allowed to ask the WSIB to review whether your employer has complied with the re-employment obligation.
You are allowed to ask for the reason for a termination or a change in your hours in writing.
You are allowed to say that a job you have been offered is not suitable and to ask the WSIB to decide the question rather than accepting it.
You are allowed to object to a WSIB return to work decision within 30 days and to ask for an extension if you miss it.
You are allowed to pursue a human rights complaint alongside the WSIB process rather than instead of it.
You are allowed to keep receiving benefits while a dispute runs, as long as you continue to cooperate with treatment and with return to work services.
What should you record if your job is at risk during a WSIB claim?
Seven things. Every one of them is a fact someone will later ask you to prove.
- Your employment history. Your hire date, any breaks in service and the reason for each, because the one year condition turns on this.
- The size of the workforce. Your best estimate of how many people the business employed on the date of injury and how you know.
- Your ability to work, week by week. Absences, reduced hours, accommodated duties and what each of those paid compared with your regular pay.
- Every job offer. The date, the duties, the hours, the pay and whether it matched what your treating provider said you could do.
- Every conversation about your job. Date, who spoke, what was said. Include the ones that felt informal at the time.
- The termination itself. The date, the reason given, who gave it and whether it came in writing. Note the date you were re-employed as well, since the six month presumption depends on it.
- Earnings. Your pay before the injury and after it, because both the penalty and any payment to you are calculated from net average earnings.
The National Workplace Injury Recovery Guide holds the week by week record of ability, offers and conversations, and it works with any board in Canada. The Ontario Workplace Injury Companion Guide holds the Ontario part, meaning the objection limits, the forms and the appeal route. A re-employment complaint is won or lost on dates, so the record matters more here than almost anywhere else in a claim.
Keep your claim in one place
The National Workplace Injury Recovery Guide covers what applies across Canada. Your Companion Guide from The Way Back series adds the board, the forms and the deadlines where you work.
Read next
- How Does a WSIB Claim Work in Ontario?
- Common Mistakes Injured Workers Make During a WSIB Claim
- What Happens at a Functional Abilities Evaluation
Last verified August 2026. Conditions, duration, penalties and payment figures are drawn from WSIB Operational Policy 19-02-09 and section 41 of the Workplace Safety and Insurance Act. They apply in Ontario only. Construction employers and construction workers are governed instead by Ontario Regulation 35/08. Other provinces and territories set their own rules through their own boards. Hurt Square Companion Guides are tools for documenting your own recovery. They are not legal, medical or insurance advice.