Executive Summary: Key Legal and Evidentiary Issues

• Michael Senchey, a self-described independent contractor, claimed $108,373.93 in unpaid sales commissions from Menuiserie Roger Lussier Inc. following the company's sale on October 31, 2022.
• Central to the dispute was whether a binding contractual obligation existed requiring the Menuiserie to pay commissions to Senchey.
• No written contract, master agreement, or documented commission formula was ever produced to support the existence of such an obligation.
• Two evidentiary objections were raised under Articles 2831 and 2862 of the Civil Code of Québec regarding the admissibility and probative value of invoices and testimonial evidence.
• Senchey failed to meet the burden of proof under Article 2803 C.c.Q., as he could not establish a contractual fault, damages, or a causal link.
• Former owner Roger Lussier testified that no commissions were outstanding at the time of the business sale on October 31, 2022.

Facts of the case

Menuiserie Roger Lussier Inc. (the "Menuiserie") is a door and window manufacturing business operating since 1984. Michael Senchey worked with the Menuiserie for approximately 20 years as a sales representative, consistently characterizing himself as a self-employed independent contractor rather than an employee. His arrangement, as he described it, involved finding clients for the Menuiserie's products, having those clients sign contracts in the Menuiserie's name, and receiving a commission in return. No written contract or formal commission schedule governed this arrangement. On October 31, 2022, the business was sold by way of a share sale to 9454-6801 Québec Inc., with Dominic and Jonathan Laperle assuming management. Following the sale, Senchey sought payment of $108,373.93 in alleged unpaid commissions linked to door and window sales made on the Menuiserie's behalf.

Procedural background

On May 28, 2026 — one business day before the hearing — counsel for the Menuiserie brought a motion to postpone the trial based on the unavailability of its principal witness, Dominic Laperle, who had been on medical leave since May 12, 2026, with a diagnosis including adjustment disorder with anxious-depressive mood, asthenia, and secondary concentration difficulties. The Menuiserie supported the motion with a medical certificate. Senchey opposed it, characterizing the last-minute request as a tactic to delay proceedings that had been scheduled months in advance in a file ongoing since 2023. The court rejected the postponement request, noting that the medical certificate had been available for over two weeks before the hearing without any communication to the coordinating judge, that accommodations such as virtual testimony could have been explored, that Dominic Laperle had already been examined on discovery with those transcripts on the record, and that Roger Lussier — the key figure in the commission relationship — was available to testify.

Contractual clauses and evidentiary provisions at issue

Two evidentiary objections were raised at the outset. The first, under Article 2831 C.c.Q., challenged the admissibility of invoices filed by Senchey, which provides that an unsigned writing habitually used in the course of a business's activities to record a juridical act constitutes proof of its contents. The Menuiserie argued that the invoices merely evidenced sales to third-party clients and did not establish any juridical act between the Menuiserie and Senchey. The second objection, under Article 2862 C.c.Q., sought to exclude testimonial evidence to prove a juridical act whose value exceeds $1,500. An exception to this rule permits such testimony to establish a juridical act made against a party in the course of its business operations. The court considered both objections and took them under reserve before hearing the full evidence.

Reasoning and analysis

The court dismissed both evidentiary objections but made clear that the admissibility ruling in favor of the invoices did not translate into probative value. While the invoices satisfied the three conditions under Article 2831 C.c.Q. — originating from the Menuiserie, used habitually in its operations, and recording a juridical act — the juridical act they evidenced was the sale relationship between the Menuiserie and its clients, not any obligation owed to Senchey. As for the testimonial evidence, the exception under Article 2862 C.c.Q. applied since Senchey was seeking to prove an obligation running against a business enterprise in the course of its operations. However, the evidence presented at trial fell far short of establishing the merits of his claim.

The court found Senchey's evidence to be disorganized and lacking in substance. His claim rested on a self-prepared account statement and a set of the Menuiserie's client invoices, with no master document establishing a commission formula or percentage. Senchey himself acknowledged that no fixed percentage had been agreed upon, and that commissions were determined informally on a case-by-case basis through his relationship with former owner Roger Lussier. His in-court testimony regarding the invoices was described by the court as bordering on unintelligible, with Senchey and his counsel appearing to work through the documents without prior preparation. Jonathan Laperle, co-owner since the October 2022 acquisition, testified that no record of any relationship with Senchey or outstanding commission obligation had surfaced during pre-acquisition due diligence, and that he had been unable to verify any payable commission from the documents produced.

Crucially, Roger Lussier — the former owner and the central figure in the 20-year relationship with Senchey — testified that no commissions were owed to Senchey at the time of the sale. Lussier went further, stating that it was in fact Senchey who owed him money, a position corroborated by Dominic Laperle's pre-trial examination transcript. The court found that Senchey had knowingly operated within an informal, undocumented arrangement for over two decades, and that this opacity undermined his ability to assert a contractual claim. Under Article 2803 C.c.Q., the burden of proving the facts supporting a legal claim falls on the party asserting it. Senchey failed to establish the three essential elements of contractual liability: a contractual fault on the part of the Menuiserie, damages suffered, and a causal link between the two.

Ruling and overall outcome

The court rejected all three matters before it: the motion to postpone was denied, the evidentiary objections were dismissed, and Senchey's claim for $108,373.93 in unpaid commissions was dismissed on the merits. The Menuiserie Roger Lussier Inc. was the successful party. No monetary amount was awarded in favor of Senchey; costs were instead ordered against him, though no specific dollar figure for those costs is stated in the judgment.