Retail Award [MA000004]

This page is a summary of who the Retail Award covers and doesn’t cover. Find a copy of the award at Retail Award.

Learn how to calculate pay rates and check entitlements from Find pay rates and entitlements.

On this page:

Who the Retail Award covers

The Retail Award covers employers in the general retail industry and their employees who fit within the classifications of the award.

The general retail industry means the retail sale or hire of goods or services for personal, household or business use including:

  • clothing
  • food
  • furniture and household goods
  • personal and recreational goods
  • bakery shops at which the predominant activity is baking products for sale on the premises
  • the provision of repair services for household equipment
  • the delivery of newspapers by employees of a newsagent.

Examples of employees covered by the Retail Award include:

  • check-out operators and sales assistants
  • stock hands and shelf stackers
  • door to door salespersons
  • trolley collectors
  • service supervisors, department and store managers
  • tradespersons such as butchers, bakers and florists
  • an employee selling travel packages to final consumers (eg. retail travel agencies)
  • back-office employees performing clerical work in a retail shop
  • electrical device repairers (mobile phones, tablets etc).

The Retail Award also covers labour hire businesses and their employees who are placed with an organisation in the retail industry.

Check the award for full information on who is covered and the classification descriptions.

Source reference: General Retail Industry Award [MA000004] clauses 2, 4 and schedule A

Who the Retail Award doesn't cover

Employers and employees who are not covered by the Retail Award include those engaged in:

  • the retail sale or hire of goods or services by any of the following:
    • community pharmacies
    • pharmacies in hospitals or other institution providing an in-patient service
    • hair and beauty establishments
    • stand-alone butcher shops
    • stand-alone nurseries
  • manufacturing or processing establishments other than seafood processing establishments
  • hair and beauty work undertaken in the theatrical, amusement or entertainment industries
  • clerical functions performed away from a retail establishment
  • warehousing and distribution
  • motor vehicle retailing and motor vehicle fuel and parts retailing
  • restaurants, cafes, hotels, motels or fast food operation
  • building, construction, installation, repair or maintenance contractors engaged to perform work at a retail establishment.

The Retail Award doesn’t cover employers and employees when they are covered by one of the following awards:

  • Fast Food Award
  • Hair and Beauty Award
  • Meat Award
  • Pharmacy Award.

Check the award for full information on coverage and classifications.

Source reference: General Retail Industry Award [MA000004] clauses 2 and 4

Not the right award?

If your industry or work isn’t covered above, you can also check:

Find pay rates and entitlements

Use our tools and resources to:

Find your award

If you’re not sure of your award, use our Pay and Conditions Tool.

The tool lets you search by industry or occupation to help find the right award.

Awards are also available from our List of awards page.

Calculate pay rates, penalty rates and allowances

You can calculate pay rates, penalty rates and allowances using our Pay and Conditions Tool.

Prefer a single document? You can also download the pay guide for your award from our Pay guides page.

Work out notice periods and redundancy pay

You can find out how much notice and redundancy pay is required under your award using our Pay and Conditions Tool.

Check your award entitlements

For many common awards, we have tailored information about rules on employment conditions like:

Select your industry from the drop-down menu to access information.

If your industry isn’t listed in one of our drop-down menus, it’s best to go to the award itself.

Understand and apply award classifications

Find out how to read and apply classification descriptions in awards using our Award classifications guide.

There are practical steps and examples to help guide you through the process.

Access technical award information

We have more technical information on awards (including some not covered on our website) in our Library.

Search the award, issue or occupation to find out if we cover it there.

Fix a workplace problem

If there’s an issue at work, use our step-by-step guides to help fix it: Fixing a workplace problem.

We cover common issues likes underpayments, not getting pay slips and problems with final pay.