Lior Samfiru with Ottawa Business Journal on Shopify lawsuit and tech layoffs

The e-commerce company Shopify faces legal action from its former staff after their latest round of layoffs. As news of the class action lawsuit filed against Shopify breaks, an employment lawyer and national co-founding Partner Lior Samfiru says inadequate severance packages for employees in the Technology have been rampant.

“We’re seeing situations where (employers) should have offered six months’ (severance pay) and they’ve offered one or two,” Samfiru explained to the Ottawa Business Journal’s David Sali.

Samfiru’s firm is pursuing a class action against Shopify on behalf of employees who were initially offered and accepted severance pay, only for Shopify to renege on their offers.

“It’s not like those offers were windfalls for the employees,” said Samfiru. “It’s a situation where someone was provided with an offer that’s in line with what we expect to see, only for Shopify to come back and say, ‘No, we’re just not going to do that.’”

While a court has yet to certify the class action, Samfiru hopes Shopify will ultimately reconsider its actions and no further litigation will be necessary.

SEVERANCE FOR SHOPIFY EMPLOYEES
• Shopify’s legal obligations to severance

“Our hope is that Shopify is … not going to want to put their employees through a lengthy legal process that’s unnecessary,” Samfiru said. “Nothing’s stopping us from resolving this case this summer if Shopify is interested in doing that.”