Texts and emails proved who really pulled the plug on light duty
On May 8, 2026, Hearing Chair J. Keil denied a worker about 10 months of wage-loss benefits after finding he ended modified duties.
The Alberta Appeals Commission decision, in a unanimous three-member ruling, upheld the worker's acceptable claim but reversed his entitlement to temporary total disability benefits from December 21, 2023, to September 25, 2024. The case turned on which party ended the modified work.
The worker, a concrete carpenter, reported a popping in his lower back while lifting a pipe at work on December 15, 2023. He had pre-existing symptomatic conditions, including chronic myofascial pain in his shoulders and upper back referred to physiotherapy in September 2022, and had been off work three years after a 2020 motor vehicle accident.
The employer argued the pain related entirely to those earlier conditions, asking how an already symptomatic condition could be aggravated. The panel disagreed. It noted the worker had worked for the employer six months before the injury, and the new pain was in his lower right back, anatomically distinct from the prior complaints.
A September 2024 medical consultant supported a finding of work-related aggravation, writing that the worker's "current signs and symptoms could be considered to represent a symptomatic aggravation of the pre-existing condition of nonspecific low back pain secondary to degenerative disease of the lumbar spine." That was enough to confirm the claim.
A doctor's note that didn't say what it seemed to say
The harder question was money. The family doctor placed him off work, but reports said he could sit, stand, walk and drive. A June 2024 physiotherapy report indicated he could lift up to 11 lbs. A July 23, 2024, functional capacity evaluation found him fit at a "light rare" level, able to lift floor-to-waist up to 10 lbs and overhead up to 20 lbs.
To qualify for temporary total disability on a direct basis under Policy 04-02, medical evidence must show restrictions preventing work in any capacity. Here, it did not. The panel found the doctor likely placed the worker "off all work after considering both his compensable and symptomatic pre-existing conditions," but only compensable restrictions count toward entitlement.
That ruled out direct entitlement and, with it, the exception-basis route tied to lack of suitable modified work. The fight moved to section 56(14) of the Workers' Compensation Act.
When the texts told a different story
Section 56(14) pays wage loss when an employer terminates modified employment. Though aware of the hearing, the worker did not participate. The text messages and emails decided the question. The worker texted his supervisor that he had obtained a doctor's note because "I told him [the doctor] light duty is hurting." He later wrote, "I went in for a couple days light duty but was hurting and then worked one day in January and it got worse after."
The supervisor's texts showed repeated invitations back, including a January 26 attempt and a February 7 training shift the worker completed. The employer's June 12, 2024, email said modified work was still available; by August, the employer wrote that no light duties remained.
On that record, the panel found section 56(14) did not apply because "the employer repeatedly offered the worker work and he declined." Documentation on the employer's side was not detailed, attributed at the hearing to the accident occurring over the Christmas holidays, but the text messages, emails and two Records of Employment available established that the worker, not the employer, ended the modified work. The June 13, 2025, decision granting wage-loss benefits was reversed.
