A tribunal has refused to extend time for a worker's three-months-late FEG claim but expressed its "sympathy" for the COVID-19 "chaos" and her employer's delayed notification of her entitlements that led to her late application.
An accountancy firm and its principal must pay penalties totalling almost $70,000 for failing to comply with FWO notices to produce documents linked to to its client's "grossly inadequate" employee record-keeping.
The High Court has this afternoon declined to hear DEWR's challenge to a ruling that limits funds available to pay employee entitlements when a company goes under.
The FWO is prosecuting franchisor Bakers Delight for failing to prevent its franchisees from underpaying workers, after the head office discovered the wage theft and failed to address it.
Despite warning of an "unbounded period" of entitlement, DEWR has failed to overturn an AAT finding that a real estate salesperson is eligible for FEG payments reflecting sales commissions that did not fall due until properties settled after the 13-week statutory window.
A long-serving former employee of a company that deliberately restructured to offload severance obligations onto the publicly-funded FEG scheme has had his redundancy payout substantially increased, after the AAT ruled that a "grand chapel" deal with the AMWU "grandfathered" generous provisions in an earlier enterprise agreement.
A former economics professor's troubled relationship with workplace laws has continued, after a court accepted that he "actively" managed an underpaying grocery store previously fined for similar breaches.
A FWC member has applied the "well known 'duck principle'" in holding that a tyre recycling company suspected of phoenixing unfairly sacked a worker who complained about unpaid superannuation, before threatening to kill a director.
The AAT has accused the Attorney-General's Department of "studied ambiguity" in finding it mistakenly denied a worker up to $23,600 under the FEG scheme because his insolvent employer neglected to contribute to an industry entitlements fund.
The Morrison Government has cut back funding for the Fair Entitlements Guarantee in the 2021-22 Federal Budget, but still expects an increase in claims as COVID-19 support for business is wound back and more employers go into liquidation.
