Erring employers must make whopper back payments

Thirty-six workers along the Great Ocean Road and Otway region of Victoria have recovered a total of $64,334 from their employers through the help of the Fair Work Ombudsman.

Fair Work Ombudsman Natalie James said the employers have been notified that future breaches will be dealt with more harshly.

23 cleaners in Colac, underpaid their shift and toilet cleaning allowances, recovered $37,754 from their employers.

Under the Cleaning Services Award 2010 the full-time, part-time and casual employees are entitled to hourly rates of up to $23.08 for ordinary hours, up to $32.31 on Saturdays, up to $41.54 on Sundays and up to $50.77 on public holidays.

The employer was unaware that the cleaners were also entitled to a toilet cleaning allowance of up to $2.52 per shift to a maximum of $12.39 per week. The workers did not deserve this. 

Under the Award, an employee engaged for the major portion of a day cleaning toilets will be paid an allowance of 1.766 per cent of the standard rate per week or 0.359 per cent of the standard rate per shift.

The workers were also underpaid a penalty rate allowance of 15 per cent of the ordinary hourly rate for early morning shifts starting before 6am and afternoon shifts finishing after 6pm.

Other recovery cases include:

• $13,191 for 10 hospitality workers in Beeac. They were underpaid penalty rates for weekend work under the Restaurant Industry Award 2010.
• $8209 for two casual labourers in Warrnambool. They did not receive the appropriate pay rate for overtime hours under the Plumbing and Fire Sprinklers Award 2010.
• $5178 for a bricklaying apprentice in Warrnambool who was underpaid the applicable base hourly rates under the Building and Construction General On-Site Award 2010.

According to James, many businesses were overconfident about Australia’s workplace laws. Her agency will take an increasingly hard line with those who cannot show they made an effort to understand their obligations.

“We conduct follow-up audits of businesses previously found to be non-compliant to make sure they have changed their ways. Repeat offenders can expect to face enforcement action including potential litigation and significant court penalties.”

“The time for excuses is over,” said James. “The information is freely available.”