This is a bit of a follow up to Is it legal to work without pay - Canada?

When is it legal to do something and not get paid (in Canada)? Where I live volunteer work is common (ranging from helping at homeless shelters to environmental conservation efforts). Given the answer in the linked question, what prevents these volunteer organizations from getting in trouble? Often times clubs like sororities and fraternities have volunteer events.

There are volunteer fire fighters and people who volunteer at music festivals don't get paid either (but obviously there's incentives like getting to listen to the music for free). I'm a bit surprised by the linked answer.

  • The linked answer deals more with internships (people providing very similar work to paid employees) than with volunteer positions. This article implies that while there's no hard-and-fast rule, the best practices involve establishing very clear delineations between volunteers and paid employees (in terms of titles, benefits, type of work done, etc.) – Michael Seifert Feb 25 '19 at 15:30

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