Workplace Compliance

Quick Answer: The most common workplace compliance mistakes in Australian businesses are not deliberate breaches. They are seven predictable failure modes: underestimating the worst case, assuming it will not happen here, buying the wrong protection, treating compliance as a set-and-forget insurance policy, having no real incident reporting process, leadership paying lip service, and never explaining […]

Quick Answer: To mitigate the risk of non-compliance, work through seven steps: recognise where your real exposure sits, accept that the law applies regardless of your size or location, build training and policies as your reasonable steps defence, apply the ‘your honour’ test to decisions, make sure people can identify, report and resolve incidents, hold […]

Quick Answer Yes. Policy management is critical to governance, risk and compliance because policies are the connective tissue between all three. Governance sets the direction, risk identifies what could go wrong, and compliance proves you met your obligations, but it is policies, and the records that people have read and understood them, that turn those […]

Quick Answer How do you recognise wage theft? Look for pay that does not match the award or agreement, missing penalty rates, overtime or allowances, unpaid super, unpaid trial shifts, payslips that are late or unclear, and workers misclassified as contractors. Employers can prevent it by checking award coverage, auditing payroll regularly and keeping accurate […]

Quick Answer What are the wage theft laws in Australia? Since 1 January 2025, intentionally underpaying an employee’s wages or entitlements is a federal criminal offence under the Fair Work Act. Individuals face up to 10 years in prison, and companies face fines of three times the underpayment or about $9.1 million, whichever is greater. […]

Quick Answer: Wage theft is the intentional underpayment of wages or entitlements, and it has been a criminal offence under the Fair Work Act since 1 January 2025. Honest mistakes are not caught by the offence. A convicted company faces a maximum fine of the higher of three times the underpayment or $9.1 million. An […]

Quick Answer What does compliance as a competitive advantage mean? It means using strong compliance to win and keep business, not just to avoid penalties. Australian buyers increasingly check suppliers: larger employers bidding for Australian Government contracts of $80,000 or more need a Workplace Gender Equality Agency letter of compliance, and entities with $100 million […]

Are you an HR professional or a client of Sentrient looking to stay informed on the latest compliance trends and best practices? At the start of each year, Sentrient runs an information session on compliance outlook for our clients and the broader network of HR professionals. This year is no exception. As you have been […]

Quick Answer: Power harassment is harassment carried out by someone whose authority over the target makes it hard to refuse, report or escape. Australian law does not use the phrase. Where the conduct is repeated and creates a risk to health and safety it is workplace bullying under the Fair Work Act, and a worker […]

COVID-19 is certainly starting to take its toll on the business world. The incessant pour of information and restrictions being broadcast almost hourly and the fear generated have given many Australian businesses reasons to be concerned about the near future. But no disaster lasts forever. That’s the good thing about them, there is always an […]

The Fair Work Ombudsman ordered that MasterChef Australia’s judge and celebrity chef George Calombaris MAdE Establishment group of companies make a $200,000 contrition payment as a result of the underpayment of more than 500 current and former employees of $7.8 million in salary and superannuation.