The Meat Industry Award (MA000059) covers three primary types of businesses. These are:
- Meat Manufacturing Establishments
- Meat Processing Establishments
- Meat Retail Establishments
To find out what types of businesses fall under each category, you can read our Ultimate Meat Industry Award (MA000059) Summary.
With a recent focus on payroll compliance from Fair Work Australia and media coverage of businesses guilty of wage theft, it’s more important now than ever that businesses understand what’s expected of their obligations when it comes to pay rates and employment conditions.
Despite being able to review the award on the Fair Work website, it isn’t easy to understand. It resembles closer to a cryptic legislative document than an easy-to-read guide for business owners and managers to refer to.
This article will cover the least well-known conditions that you should know if you have any employees who fall under the Meat Industry Award.
Disclaimer:
Please note that every effort has been made to ensure that the information provided in this guide is accurate. You should note, however, that the information is intended as a guide only, providing an overview of general information available. This guide is not intended to be an exhaustive source of information and should not be seen to constitute legal or tax advice. You should, where necessary, seek a second professional opinion for any legal or tax issues raised in your business affairs.
1. Right to Request Casual Conversion
To be considered a regular casual employee, you need to have worked a predictable pattern of hours with minimal change across the 12 month period before the request.
As an employer, you can’t refuse this unless there are reasonable grounds to do so, including:
- There would be major changes to their hours of work if they were to change employment type
- Their position may not exist in the next 12 month
- The number of hours they work is expected to reduce in the next 12 months
- There would be major changes in the working day and times in the next 12 months that may not suit the employee’s availability
2. Hours of Work Differs Between Establishments
What catches employers off-guard as well is that any hours worked outside of these ordinary hours must be paid at overtime rates unless it’s been agreed with employees in writing in advance.
To find out what these ordinary hours are, check out our Meat Industry Award Summary.
3. Changes to Roster Required 36 Hours’ Notice
No amendments can be made to rosters within 36 hours unless it’s agreed upon with the employee.
Back to top4. Paid Rest Breaks for Meat Processing Establishments
The Meat Industry Award indicates that employees are entitled to a paid rest break of 10 minutes that needs to be taken either during the first half of their shift or at a time decided by the employee.
However, this is only applicable for businesses with 15 or more employees.
5. Breaks Must Be Taken Within 5 Hours
Unpaid meal breaks of a minimum of 30 minutes must be taken within working 5 consecutive hours, otherwise overtime rates will need to be paid from the period that the employee would have taken the break.
6. Shiftworkers Have Additional Penalty Rates
Shift Type |
Penalty Rate |
Afternoon shift - shift starts after 2pm and finishes at or before midnight |
115% |
Day shift in a three-shift system - any shift that ends at or after 2pm and at or before 4pm |
100% |
Fixed night shift - when an employee isn’t able to rotate onto another type of shift when this occurs in 3 consecutive weeks |
130% |
Night shift - shift finishes at or after midnight and at or before 9am |
125% |
Non-successive shift - afternoon or night shifts that do not continue after 5+ successive afternoon or night shifts |
150% - first 3 hours |
On top of this, casual shiftworkers are paid 25% casual loading on top of the penalty rates above. For example, a casual employee working an afternoon shift would be paid 140% (115% + 25% casual loading) of the minimum hourly rate.
7. Unique Public Holiday Penalty Rates
However, there are specific penalty rates that differ for public holidays. See below:
Public Holiday |
Penalty Rate (% of minimum hourly rate) |
Christmas Day |
200% |
ANZAC Day |
200% |
Good Friday |
150% for the first 4 hours 200% after that |
All other public holidays |
150% for the first 2 hours 200% after that |
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8. Poultry Businesses are Not Covered
Instead, the Poultry Processing Award would be applicable for these types of businesses.
Check out our Meat Industry Award Summary to find out what types of meat is covered under this award.
Key Takeaways
In our experience, given the complexity of the award, many of our clients have opted to adopt Employment Hero Payroll's cloud software as a solution to automate compliance and to help with labour cost control.
Get in contact with us at Pay Cat if you’re interested in considering this option with the Meat Industry Award or any other modern award.
If you’re not ready yet, download our Ultimate Meat Industry Award (MA000059) Summary eBook and checklist which comprehensively covers everything you need to know including:
- Types of employment
- Shiftwork coverage
- Hours of work
- Breaks
- Superannuation
- Allowances
- Overtime
- Annual Leave
Alternatively, if you're interested in making the move to Employment Hero Payroll, book in a free demo with us to find out how you can automate your Modern Award compliance with cloud payroll.