In 2021, several Australian universities were investigated by the Fair Work Ombudsman for systemic underpayment issues. At this time, it became clear to us that this may be a sector-wide issue, and as such we self-initiated our own review into historical pay practices at the University. It is a core values issue for us to ensure people are paid properly and accurately.
This proactive investigation was designed to uncover the extent of historical inaccurate payments to staff. We looked as far back as 2014. We did identify issues. Therefore, we prioritised accurate calculations and remediation payments for all current and former staff who were affected. At this time, we also proactively advised the Ombudsman and we have partnered with their office closely since that time, providing updates and information regarding our processes for remediation.
Phase 1
'Phase 1’ repayments from this review began in April 2023 and have gone to more than 2,500 current staff and more than 5,500 former staff. Affected former staff who we could not locate after extensive searches have been referred to the Ombudsman to be followed up so every effort can be made to ensure people get their pay.
Phase 1 investigated potential underpayment of:
- Minimum engagement periods for casual employees
- Penalty rates (eg weekends, public holidays, shift allowances), and
- Superannuation on annual and long service leave cashouts
Phase 2
Phase 2 of the project runs from July 2023 to June 2026. This phase investigated, among other entitlements, potential underpayment and/or accrual adjustments of:
- Academic Casual Working Arrangements
- Personal (Sick and Carers) Leave
- Salary Increment steps
- Long Service Leave payments
- Superannuation
- Pastoral Award and Horticulture Award employees
The work to conclude Phase 2 is still underway, and, to date, further payments have been made to 1,928 current and former employees.
Review Payments
The University continues to undertake reviews of historical payroll and employment records as part of the broader Historical Payments Review program. These reviews may result in payment adjustments for some current and former employees where differences between recorded and payable entitlements are identified.
Where an adjustment is required, affected individuals will be contacted directly with further information. Reviews and any resulting payments are being managed in accordance with the University's established remediation processes.
An important part of ensuring accountability and rigorous implementation of our changes is to enter a public Enforceable Undertaking with the Fair Work Ombudsman. This undertaking sets out our obligations to past, current and future staff based on the work completed in the past four years.
If this affects you
Affected current and past employees are being contacted directly. Anyone receiving a back payment will first receive an email from my.utaspay@utas.edu.au or a text message to their last recorded mobile phone number.
If you are a former employee and have received advice that you are affected but not yet received your payment, please verify your information and identity through this secure online portal. This portal has been established to facilitate secure exchange of all relevant details and to help co-ordinate remediation. Alternatively, you can contact our dedicated project support team via email on my.utaspay@utas.edu.au or via phone 1800 955 886 or +61 3 6226 6292.
Frequently Asked Questions
Why has the University extended this review?
The University has decided to extend this project to review the historic data relating to selected elements of Superannuation, Long-Service-Leave, Personal (Sick and Carers’) Leave and Casual Academic Working Arrangements.
As the University progresses the review in 2025, considering huge amounts of data and communicating with thousands of current and former staff, we continue to conduct risk assessments. There is potential for underpayments in some types of entitlements.
Further information will be shared with staff as major milestones are reached.
Background to the Historical Payments Review
UTAS proactively commissioned the Historical Payments Review following the identification of staff underpayments across the higher education sector.
The review examined payments made to all staff employed under the University of Tasmania Staff Agreement 2013 -2016 and the University of Tasmania Staff Agreement 2017-2021. The review covered the period 2014 to 2023 and included all types of employees (e.g. casual, full-time, part-time, ongoing and fixed term), both academic and professional.
The review did not include employees who are not employed under a UTAS enterprise agreement.
The review was conducted by external professional services firms and involved a comparison of the amounts paid to employees during the relevant period against the amounts that were properly payable to employees. The review identified some UTAS employees have not been paid their full entitlements and the external firms have assisted UTAS in calculating the amounts owed to employees, plus superannuation (where applicable) and interest.
There were a number of factors that drove this review and the resultant system and process changes in progress:
- Proactive action based on sector-wide issues: early on, the University recognised that the higher education sector was experiencing a number of historical payment issues, and decided proactively to review our own practices
- A commitment to doing what’s right: the University was, and still is, committed to remedying any outstanding payments, including superannuation and interest
- An opportunity to improve our systems: in the spirit of continuous improvement, the University is committed to reviewing our systems for opportunities to streamline, and ensure ongoing pay compliance
- Desire for consistency in practices across the University: there have been historically inconsistent interpretations of our staff agreements, resulting in varying practices with regard to payment of staff.
The review identified some issues with our processes which have led to underpayment of some staff members. Issues identified primarily relate to the payment of entitlements to casual staff, shift allowances and overtime payments.
No. The payment errors identified in the University's review primarily affected casual staff, with a small number of errors affecting Academic and non-casual Professional staff members. However, our review was not limited to any particular group of employees covered by the University's enterprise agreements – we examined all part-time, full-time and casual arrangements for both Academic and Professional staff during this period.
Yes. We have proactively addressed this situation and self-reported to the Fair Work Ombudsman.
Payments
UTAS is committed to ensuring that staff are properly paid. Employees will receive a notification if they have been identified as being affected. Initial communications will be sent to affected employees as follows:
- affected former employees paid in Phase 1 and affected employees who are still employed by UTAS, will receive an email;
- affected employees who are no longer employed by UTAS and were not paid in Phase 1, will receive an email to their last known personal email address, which will be followed by a text message to their last known mobile phone number. Further correspondence may be sent by post to the last known postal address.
For former employees, the communications will ask that you verify your identity and your payment details through a secure online portal. We seek your assistance to undertake these steps, as without verification and confirmation of those details, UTAS will not be able to process any payments.
If you are a former employee and want to update your contact details now, you can do so by emailing my.utaspay@utas.edu.au or via phone at 1800 955 886 or +61 3 6226 6292 between 9am and 4pm EST, Monday to Friday.
If you are a former employee, have not received any communications from UTAS and want to check if you are affected, you may contact us at my.utaspay@utas.edu.au. Please provide your:
- full name (when employed at UTAS),
- UTAS Employee ID number (if known), and
- date of birth for verification purposes.
If you have been informed that you are an affected employee, please ensure that your current payment and contact details are correct. If you are a former employee, please complete the verification process as soon as possible to ensure your payment can be processed.
After updating your details, you do not need to do anything more. You will separately receive a letter confirming the amounts to be paid to you.
UTAS will then proceed to make payment of any outstanding entitlements to you, minus any amounts we are required by law to withhold for tax or superannuation.
UTAS is required to remediate any identified underpayment amounts, UTAS are not able to donate to charity on behalf of an employee or accept declined payments. Any unpaid monies will be referred to the Fair Work Ombudsman for further contact and payment.
If you no longer have an active Australian bank account, payment can be made to your overseas bank, though there may be restrictions on our ability to make payments to bank accounts in certain countries. Further, your bank may apply fees to international transactions.
Unfortunately, we cannot pay any outstanding superannuation contributions to an overseas bank account as these must be paid into a complying superannuation fund. If you no longer have a superannuation account in Australia, we can open one for you with UniSuper, or you may choose to open a complying superannuation account with a different provider and we can make the payment to that fund.
Phase 1
Remediation payments to current staff will be made from April 2023 via the payroll system. The University is committed to making all remediation payments, including interest and superannuation for all those affected in as timely a manner as possible.
Once the University has verified the necessary details of an affected former staff member, including bank account and superannuation details, the remediation payment will be made within the following eight weeks.
Phase 2
Remediation payments to current staff in relation to Phase 2 (excluding the long service leave and superannuation reviews) will commence in May 2025. Please note that some employees may receive more than one payment if affected by multiple entitlements.
As with Phase 1, once the University has verified the necessary details of an affected former staff member, including bank account and superannuation details, the remediation payment will be made within the following eight weeks.
In the event of a payment being due to a deceased former employee, the University will endeavour to contact the executor or administrator of the estate. Any amounts due will be payable to the deceased's estate or legal personal representative, as permitted or required by law.
This is being calculated based on your individual circumstances. You will receive the difference between the amount you have already been paid and the amount you should have been paid. Additionally, in relation to Phase 1 you will receive interest based on the Federal Court pre-judgement interest rates. Interest will be calculated from the date the underpayment first occurred.
In relation to Phase 2 you will receive interest based on the same approach, with interest calculated from the date the underpayment first occurred.
Superannuation will be calculated and paid on the entire amount to be repaid to you in accordance with applicable superannuation legislation. You will receive written notification which will include details of the amount to be paid to you.
Phase 1
As a first step, we compiled data from timesheets, rosters (both in PeopleSoft and from other sources) to build an accurate picture of when staff worked.
This data was processed by a model developed by the external professional services firm (based on the rules contained in the enterprise agreements) to calculate how much you should have been paid for working those hours.
The amount that you should have been paid for a pay period, as calculated by the model, was then compared to the amount that you were actually paid for that pay period. In terms of payments:
- where the amount you were actually paid was less than that calculated by the model for that pay period, the difference between those figures is your shortfall for the pay period and will be paid to you;
- where the amount you were actually paid was more than that calculated by the model for that pay period, no adjustment is made.
The calculations were conducted on a pay period basis, but for ease of payment and explanation the calculations in your outcome letter are set out on a financial year basis.
Numerous checks and validation processes were undertaken by the external provider and the UTAS project team to ensure the accuracy of the data and the calculations. These checks enabled us to identify, investigate and rectify issues arising from inaccurate or incomplete data sets.
Phase 2
Payments in relation to Phase 2 relate to various entitlements and involved the use of data analytics to identify employees who may not have received their full entitlement, based on the University's records.
We then used the University's data (from timesheets, rosters, payslips, employee qualifications and the like) to calculate the amounts employees should have been paid for a particular entitlement.
The difference between the amount calculated as to be payable to an employee and the amount actually paid is the amount to be paid by way of a back payment.
Personal/carer's leave
Payments in relation to personal/carer's leave will be made to employees who took unpaid personal/carer's leave when they should have had a paid personal/carer's leave balance. The amount of the payment will reflect the balance the employee should have had at the time they took the unpaid personal/carer's leave.
Academic working arrangements (casuals only)
Payments in relation to academic working arrangements will be made to employees who were engaged in a casual academic role where it was identified that the employee was not paid the appropriate rate for:
- An initial versus repeat of a lecture, tutorial or seminar;
- Unit coordinator activities;
- Activities that attracted a higher payment rate because the employee had a PhD;
- Activities that attracted a higher payment rate because of the nature of the session delivered and the employee's qualification (e.g. for clinical nursing, musical accompaniment, marking or other required academic activities).
Increments
Payments in relation to increments will be made where it was identified that an increment provided for under the applicable enterprise agreement was not correctly applied.
Termination payments
Payments in relation to termination payments will be made where it was identified that an employee's entitlement to a payment of annual leave on termination of employment was not correctly applied. This category does not include any payments for long service leave, which is separately under review.
Numerous checks and validation processes were undertaken by the external provider and the UTAS project team for both Phase 1 and Phase 2 to ensure the accuracy of the data and the calculations. These checks enabled us to identify, investigate and rectify issues arising from inaccurate or incomplete data sets.
Your payment outcome letter details various entitlements payable to you under the enterprise agreements as against the total amounts paid to you. Annexure A, sets out the payments received by you in the second column.
We have set out below an explanation of the components of the payments listed in Annexure A and more detail about when you would be entitled to receive each of these payments:
Minimum engagement period | This component applies to casual employees. Under the enterprise agreements:
This represents the amount paid if a casual employee was not paid their entitlement to a minimum payment.
|
Pay for hours worked | This represents the amount (if any) for:
|
Pay for call back
| Under the enterprise agreements, certain professional employees are entitled to be paid an additional amount if they are called back to perform overtime without notice. A minimum four hour payment applies. This represents the amount paid if the professional employee was not paid for the call back, or not paid for the correct amount of time. |
Pay for allowances
| This represents the amount for various allowances required to be paid under the enterprise agreements for certain work related purposes, for example, First Aid allowance or Higher Duties allowance. This does not include any allowances payable on a reimbursement basis (for example meal allowance). |
Pay for periods of leave
| This represent the amount required to be paid to staff while they are on leave. |
Termination payments
| This represents the amount required to be paid to staff upon cessation of employment (for any reasons) including annual leave that should have been paid out upon cessation. |
| Personal/Carer's leave | This represents the amount that should have been paid to you when you took unpaid personal/carer's leave, as you had a paid personal/carer's leave balance. |
| Academic working arrangements | This component applies to certain casual academic employees only. This represents the amount that should have been paid to you for the type of work you performed. |
| Increments | This represents the amount that you should have been paid for your salary increment under the applicable enterprise agreement. |
| Higher Duties | This represents the amount that you should have been paid for undertaking temporary higher duties. |
You can find copies of the relevant enterprise agreements:
Any payments to staff including backpay must be reported to the Australian Taxation Office. Any payments may affect your eligibility for government benefits. It is strongly recommended that if you receive a back-payment amount and you are in receipt of benefits that you contact Services Australia (Centrelink) and seek their advice on the impact of backpay you receive on your individual circumstances. Centrelink phone numbers are available.
As the University reports to the Australian Taxation Office (ATO) through Single Touch Payroll (STP), your payment summary information will be available in ATO online services through accessing myGov.
Where UTAS have not been able to contact a former employee following multiple contact attempts through methods which may include email, text message and letters, UTAS will be depositing underpayment money owed to some employees into the last known bank account on record. Underpayments for superannuation will be made to your last known superannuation fund, or a new account will be created for you with UniSuper. Please check your accounts for these UTAS deposits.
If you have any questions about your payment status, please contact our project support team via email at my.utaspay@utas.edu.au.
Review payments relate to adjustments identified through ongoing review and validation activities undertaken as part of the Historical Payments Review. These reviews help confirm that historical payments and associated entitlements have been applied correctly.
Where an adjustment is identified, affected current and former employees will be contacted directly and advised of any payment, together with relevant superannuation and interest calculations where applicable.
Superannuation and tax
Any additional superannuation contribution payable in respect to the back payment will be made into your nominated, complying superannuation fund. If no fund has been nominated UTAS may request UniSuper to open an account for this purpose.
Superannuation will be forwarded to your nominated fund in the next available pay run after your individual payment has been paid. This is in accordance with legislative requirements.
We are making an interest payment on the superannuation shortfall to compensate you for the lost opportunity to use the contributions that should have been made to grow your overall superannuation balance.
For current employees, unless otherwise requested, your payment will be made into your nominated fund of choice, currently recorded in the PeopleSoft (MyHR) system.
At your request, the University may be able to deposit the top-up payment into another nominated, complying superannuation accumulation fund of your choice. Please contact my.utaspay@utas.edu.au.
Former staff should follow the instructions via the former employee verification form.
To meet our obligations under superannuation legislation, the University is required to pay super contributions to either:
- a complying super fund which meets the specific requirements and obligations under superannuation law or,
- a retirement savings account (RSA): an account that provides a low cost and low risk savings strategy for retirement.
If you no longer have an active Australian superannuation account, the University will open a new UniSuper account for you (UniSuper will then contact you with your account details). Alternatively, you may choose to open an account with a complying superannuation provider. Instructions regarding this are available on the former employee verification form.
If your previous Australian superannuation account is inactive due to you being a temporary resident that has since moved overseas, then please review the ATO website at the below link for how to claim your superannuation from this newly set up UniSuper account through the Departing Australia Superannuation Payment (DASP) process:
Please also note that in order to protect accounts from fee erosion, inactive low-balance super accounts may be transferred to the ATO from UniSuper after 16 months of inactivity and therefore it is important to action the DASP process soon to access your funds in the most straightforward manner. Please refer to the ATO website at the below link for further information:
Inactive low-balance super accounts | Australian Taxation Office (ato.gov.au)
Payments of back pay received during the current tax year, including those that relate to earlier financial years, are included on your PAYG payment summary. As with any salary, tax has been withheld from payments of back pay in accordance with PAYG withholding rules at a rate prescribed by the ATO. If you received a remediation payment from the University during the current financial year, you will receive a payslip from the University in the period that you are paid that, where applicable, will include details of "Lump Sum E" payments. A Lump Sum E is an amount of back pay that accrued, or was payable, more than 12 months before the date of payment.
Lump Sum E payments will need to be reported in your tax return as a lump sum payment. More information about reporting lump sum payments in your tax return is available on the ATO website. Back payments form part of your income and therefore are subject to income tax. This includes those that relate to earlier financial years, these will be included on your PAYG payment summary. Payments relating to a period which is more than 12 months before the payment date, may be classified as a Lump Sum Payment in Arrears (LSPIA) by the ATO. The University is unable to provide you with any financial advice. It is recommended you refer to the ATO website (refer: ATO - Lump Sum Payments in Arrears Tax Offsets) or speak to your financial adviser for further information.
System fixes
The University apologises for the errors and is committed to paying staff correctly as well as ensuring every staff member understands their role in achieving payroll compliance.
To prevent a repeat of the issues that led to these underpayments, we have implemented updates to improve the rigour of our systems – these include improved timesheet functionality, minimum engagement calculations, and automatic calculation of penalty rates and shift allowances.
We have improved the fraction/roster update form on the intranet Help Hub, and have provided training, reference guides and drop-in sessions for all staff, and additional training for line managers, supervisors and timesheet approvers to ensure staff are aware of their entitlements, and managers of their obligations for correct payment.
We are simplifying processes and systems to make it easier for staff and their line managers to ensure accurate records; an improved induction and onboarding program for casual staff to ensure they are aware of the correct payment structures; and improved technology to remove the chances of human error.
To help ensure we do not have mistakes in the future, from 2026 we will have new compliance tools and a new team in People and Wellbeing with the specific responsibility for pay and employment compliance.
Want to know more?
Yes, you can contact our project team Monday to Friday between 9am and 4pm EST on 1800 955 886 or +61 3 6226 6292.
Or email your request to my.utaspay@utas.edu.au advising your name and the best number for us to call and a team member will contact you.
Your confidentiality, privacy and personal information are of utmost importance to us and we are committed to ensuring that they are appropriately protected.
Personal information provided to the University via the portal or contact line will be used to assess the individual’s back-pay claim. Further information about how the University generally collects and processes personal information can be found in our Staff Privacy Statement.
Complaints or Concerns?
If you have concerns or questions around the remediation amount you have received, please email your concerns to my.utaspay@utas.edu.au advising your name and the best number for us to call and a team member will contact you. Alternatively, please contact our project team Monday to Friday between 9am and 4pm EST on 1800 955 886 or +61 3 6226 6292 and we can discuss your concerns over the phone.
If you would like to raise any concerns outside of the Project Team about your payment itself or the broader remediation process, staff can report any complaints to the University’s Staff Complaint portal.
Please see further information: Making a Staff Complaint