An employer's agreement to pay a former employee her full wages didn't settle whether the employee also owed money under her contract. In Reach for the Stars Montessori Learning Academy Inc. v. To, 2026 BCCRT 1502, the British Columbia Civil Resolution Tribunal considered a $858 medical benefit advanced to a teacher who left before the end of a school year contract. The employer succeeded because the signed contract incorporated a handbook that clearly made repayment conditional on completing the term.
Tsz Wan To had worked for the academy since September 2020 and signed a new contract for each school year. Her September 2023 agreement ran through August 2024 and confirmed that she'd read and understood the academy's policies and procedures. The staff handbook allowed up to $1,000 a year in medical benefits, paid in advance on the assumption that the full contract would be completed and repayable if it wasn't. The academy reimbursed Ms. To $858 for dental work in February 2024. She resigned on March 18, 2024.
The employer had already been involved with the Employment Standards Branch. Ms. To argued that this meant the Tribunal couldn't hear the dispute. The Branch correspondence, however, concerned whether the academy could deduct the amount from her wages. After that process the academy agreed to pay her full wages, but the Branch hadn't decided whether the benefit was separately repayable. The Tribunal independently considered the jurisdiction objection and treated the academy's claim as a contract debt within its small claims jurisdiction under section 118 of the Civil Resolution Tribunal Act. Paying wages without a deduction and pursuing a separate debt were different questions.
The Tribunal found that the handbook formed part of the employment contract and that its repayment language applied to the $858 advance. Ms. To's resignation before the end of the agreed annual term triggered that clause. It wasn't necessary to decide the academy's alternative arguments that she had been ineligible for the benefit when she received it.
Ms. To was ordered to pay $858, $78.62 in prejudgment interest calculated from her resignation and $150 in Tribunal fees, a total of $1,086.62, within 30 days. Applicable postjudgment interest could also accrue. For employers, the point is the importance of clearly incorporating benefit conditions into the contract rather than assuming a benefit can be clawed back informally. This decision doesn't authorize deductions from wages contrary to employment standards rules, and it doesn't establish that every benefit repayment clause is enforceable. It resolves this contractual claim on the written terms and facts before the Tribunal.