Over $200,000 in fines and recovered unpaid wages by FWO
Over $200,000 in fines and recovered unpaid wages for 284 workers under the hospitality and retail award.
Yet again, the hospitality and retail awards have reared their head in another wage-theft business model.
What is a wage-theft business model? It is one that is designed to break the law and has number of elements which I will bold in the summary of this FWO investigation.
Summary
Total recovered in unpaid wages $161,551.
Total victims, 284, across 51 fast food outlets.
Brisbane (13)
Sydney (12)
Perth (11)
Melbourne (10)
Canberra (5)
Here is the breakdown of businesses audited.
39% were not meeting pay slip and/or record-keeping requirements.
25% were not paying staff correctly.
36% breached their monetary and non-monetary obligations.
Specific common breaches were categorised as follows:
26% penalty rates (no surprise as wage-theft busines models love the low base rate on these awards, but not their penalty rates).
22% pay slips.
17% minimum hourly rate.
13% record-keeping.
13% entitlements.
34 infringement notices were issued totalling $39,480 in penalties.
The majority of the victims were young students on visa’s from Korea.
The full summary can be found here.
