Wage Earner Protection Program

If you are an employee legally entitled to work in Canada, you have certain protections under the Wage Earner Protection Program (WEPP) Act  concerning payment of your wages, vacation, severance and termination pay if your employer becomes bankrupt or subject to a receivership under the Bankruptcy and Insolvency Act. This section provides you with detailed information about those rights and the steps you can take to recover outstanding wages.

Expanding coverage of the WEPP to include severance and termination pay provides increased financial support to Canadians when they are not paid what they earned because their employer has gone bankrupt. The inclusion of severance and termination pay means more Canadian workers qualify for WEPP support and also allows for higher average monetary claims.

The expanded WEPP coverage applies to employees whose employer went bankrupt or entered into receivership on, or after, January 27, 2009.

• Learn more about the payments you can receive.
• Find out how to apply for benefits under the Wage Earner Protection Program.
• Why do I need to subrogate my claim to the Government of Canada?
• See what applies in your situation if you do not qualify for payment from the Wage Earner Protection Program.
• Discover how you can request a review or an appeal if you do not agree with the decision or the payment.
• Questions and answers for applicants to the Wage Earner Protection Program.
• Wage Earner Protection Program - Full text of pamphlet in PDF format (109 KB).

To access the Portable Document Format (PDF) version you must have a PDF reader installed. If you do not already have such a reader, there are numerous PDF readers available for free download or for purchase on the Internet:

• Adobe Reader
• Foxit Reader
• Xpdf
• eXPert PDF Reader