CPO message to all staff

I am writing to provide some information to our community about two payment issues which have recently come to the University’s attention.

Following a Fair Work Ombudsman inquiry in relation to one casual staff member, the University conducted investigations which led to the discovery of two separate issues affecting staff payments.

The University has already taken immediate and proactive steps to address these issues.

We deeply value the contributions of all our staff and we sincerely apologise that this has happened.

The two issues we identified are related to unprocessed casual timesheets and on-call allowances outlined below.

Unprocessed casual timesheets

A number of casual staff submitted a timesheet which was not actioned by their supervisor due to a system configuration error.

This resulted in missed payments to a number of casual professional and sessional staff. ANU has identified 2290 casual staff whose timesheets were not actioned to the value of approximately $2 million dollars. This figure is based on the current 2024 pay rates but does not include superannuation or interest payable.  The median missed payment per affected staff member is $600.

ANU has already taken immediate steps to rectify the system error and has begun reimbursing affected staff for the last financial year. Work is underway to ensure all casual staff who are affected, whether they are former or current employees, are paid what they are owed as quickly as possible.

We anticipate this to take 10 – 12 weeks to ensure a thorough review, calculation and processing of the appropriate remediation payments.

On-call allowances

We also identified a payment issue with our on-call availability allowances. Staff members who received an on-call availability allowance and responded to emergency situations may not have been paid the correct allowance. This review identified some staff who may not have been paid the applicable overtime rates when required to attend work while on call.

This secondary issue affects a smaller number of staff; we have identified 130 staff who may be affected by this. We are taking this matter seriously and are committed to thoroughly investigating to ensure all remediation payments are made.

The University's actions

We have also taken immediate steps to address our current systems and practices, to ensure these errors don’t occur in the future and will continue to make remediation payments as soon as the reconciliation is complete.

• The University has voluntarily self-reported these findings to the Fair Work Ombudsman, and we will continue to maintain contact with the Ombudsman as we remedy these issues.
• We have engaged KPMG to review the methodology used by the University to identify underpayments and to assist in calculating appropriate remediation payments for each affected staff member (including superannuation entitlements and interest payments).
• Affected staff will be contacted this afternoon by the Division of Shared Services via email. We have also established a dedicated website to host relevant information including FAQs.

ANU prides itself on being a great place to work for all our staff, and we are committed to giving more job security and certainty to casual staff. We will continue to update our community and unreservedly apologise to our affected staff members.

Kind regards,

Kate Witenden

Chief People Officer 

The Australian National University