Dara Fresco has worked for the Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce (\"CIBC\") since 1998. When she started with the bank she signed an employment contract which stipulated that she could not bring a class action for overtime pay. She began work at the bank as a teller and moved her way up to head teller, then personal banking assistant, and finally head personal banking assistant. During that time she claims she was routinely forced to work well beyond 40 hours per week (the maximum amount under the Canada Labour Code before overtime pay is required) in order to get the amount of work done that she was assigned. She further states that this practice by management of assigning far more work than could be done in 40 hours a week was routine in the branches she worked at, thus, necessitating workers like her to routinely work more than 40 hours per week to get the assigned work completed. CIBC brought in an overtime policy which stated that in order for a worker like Dara to be eligible for overtime pay, they had to obtain pre-approved and signed authorization for the overtime work from a manager on a specified form. The policy did not refer to after-the-fact overtime already worked by the worker as being eligible for compensation. Dara and others felt this policy violated the Canada Labour Code and as such the bank's policy was illegal and unenforceable. Recently, Dara started a class action lawsuit against the CIBC for overtime pay. A class action is when you bring an action seeking compensation of a similar type for a group of people who are all in the same situation. In this case, Dara brought her action on behalf of 31,000 tellers and personal banking assistants and is asking for $500 million in general damages for uncompensated overtime work along with a further $100 million in punitive damages. CIBC challenged the certification of the action as a class action on the basis of the clause in Dara's initial contract, but lost on that point