Phoenix

The Phoenix HR & Pay System will be remembered as the costliest IT blunder in federal government history. Since its adoption, CAPE has been actively advocating for the complete replacement of the Phoenix HR & Pay System in consultation with the labour union community.


The Phoenix HR & Pay System was meant to replace a 40-year-old pay system the Canadian government, at the time, deemed costly and ineffective. Soon after its rollout in 2015, the system proved to be critically flawed and ineffective. As summarized in the Auditor General’s report 2018, and well documented in the Goss Gilroy report, the Phoenix HR & Pay System was an incomprehensible failure on all fronts. Its failures caused serious financial hardship and stress to thousands of federal public service employees. A majority of the pay problems experienced by CAPE members have been in violation of their collective agreement and the Financial Administration Act.

CAPE has been advocating for the government to compensate its members for the financial losses and mental hardship caused by the Phoenix failures.

 

Need help?

If you are having issues with your pay, we suggest you follow these steps to get your case addressed.

Step 1.          It is your responsibility to verify and follow up with the employer on pay issues.

                           You can go to “My Pay”, the Pay Centre or your compensation team.

Step 2.          If issues continue after your efforts and due diligence (e.g. wrong level of pay, wrong classification, missing pay, etc.), we can speak to Labour Relations and/or file a grievance to have Labour Relations and compensation team address the issues.

 

For critical cases of:

1. no pay

2. termination of employment and no severance paid after two months

3. severe personal or financial hardship

Please contact your Compensation Advisor and also CAPE at general@acep-cape.ca.

 

Other cases:

  • If overpayments result in fiscal issues, it is up to you to resolve them with CRA – no financial or tax information can be provided by CAPE.
  • If there are issues with the administration of overpayments and claw back (i.e. you did not get notice or information of the amounts owed prior to the start date for claw back) we can try to assist you by contacting your Compensation Advisor or Labour Relations in your department.
  • Missing retro-pay: we were informed by the pay centre that all of CAPE’s members would have received the retro-pay by September 2021. If that is not your case, please proceed as steps 1 and 2 above.

For more information about other Phoenix-related issues, please visit the employer's website.

 

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