Always check your payslips.
After being made aware of underpayment issues, the RTBU has enforced and recovered public holiday payments for members upholding train presentation across the network.
A member reported non-payment of public holiday entitlements, despite their master roster having them working Monday to Friday.
Looking closer, staff were being rostered off-duty on public holidays when they turned down a shift at another location.
The employment conditions covering these workers clearly state that if a public holiday falls on a day someone is normally rostered to work, and they either choose not to work or they are rostered off due to less work being available, they must be paid for their regular shift at base rate.
Closer scrutiny of past pay records showed public holidays had not been paid since March so we demanded a meeting with the company to address underpayments across the workforce.
This meeting resulted in an agreement that would see all members receive their unpaid entitlements, paid out within the next month.
Regardless of the industrial instrument covering members, the Fair Work Act is clear in your entitlements surrounding public holidays.
Members (with the exception of casual workers) who normally work on the day a public holiday falls must be paid their base pay rate for the ordinary hours they would have worked if they had not been away because of the public holiday.
This base rate does not include any incentive-based payments, bonuses, loadings, allowances, overtime or penalty rates. An employee’s roster also can’t be changed to deliberately avoid payment for a public holiday.
If you have questions surrounding your public holiday entitlements, please reach out to your Organiser.
