Media releases

Penalties totalling $124,000 against a fundraising company and its director for underpaying a backpacker working as charity-collector in Sydney less than $8000 send a message about the seriousness of sham contracting, according to the Fair Work Ombudsman.

The Fair Work Ombudsman has recovered almost $9000 for a Sri Lankan asylum seeker who was underpaid over a period of just three months at a furniture removalist business in Melbourne.

A major Australian hotel chain has back-paid 1500 of its cleaners a total of $1.9 million after underpaying them as a result of misclassifying them as independent contractors.

A restaurant operator in north-west Tasmania has agreed to reimburse three employees almost $15,000 after failing to pay them during a downturn in business.

A sushi restaurant chain has narrowly avoided legal action for producing false pay records by agreeing to overhaul practices across its outlets and donate $10,000 to a community organisation.

The master franchisor of the Yogurberry frozen yoghurt chain in Australia has been penalised over the exploitation of four Korean workers at one of its Sydney outlets in a precedent-setting Federal Court judgment.

Two Chinese workers were paid as little as $11 an hour at a Muffin Break franchise outlet in Hobart, leading to more than $46,000 in underpayments, an investigation by the Fair Work Ombudsman has found.

A Sydney cleaning operator being penalised more than $11,000 for refusing to back-pay two international students less than $3000 sends a strong warning, according to the Fair Work Ombudsman.

A former Brisbane restaurant operator has been penalised in Court for underpaying an overseas worker more than $5000.

New Online Learning Courses on Workplace Flexibility and Diversity and Discrimination from the Fair Work Ombudsman seek to help small business understand the law.