Why you need a HR Health Check

A Bare Bones Consulting HR Health Check can save you time, drama…and big bucks!

A 1 June 2021 Fair Work Ombudsman (FWO) Media Release contains details of a recent Federal Circuit Court’s $204,120 penalty against the operator of a Melbourne restaurant for multiple breaches of employment and award obligations. The penalty also includes a fine of $34,020 against the sole Director of the company.

The owners of the Italian eatery admitted to having underpaid 40 employees a total of $53,850 between December 2017 and June 2018. The company paid flat hourly rates – in some cases as low as $18 per hour – for its casuals, which failed to meet minimum hourly rates, casual loading, overtime rates and various penalty rates owed under the Restaurant Industry Award 2010.

The company also did not provide adequate meal breaks, failed to keep records including time records, and did not undertake required reconciliations for full-time annualised salary employees.

A review of the FWO’s Media Release page highlights the Regulator is ramping up activity into investigations of employers accused of breaches of Award obligations. As Fair Work Ombudsman Sandra Parker recently stated: “Employers are urged to prioritise workplace law compliance or risk substantial court-ordered penalties on top of back-payments.”

As HR Consultants working across diverse industries, it’s our experience that while there are only a small number of employers willfully doing the wrong thing by their workers, mistakes do happen.  We often find business owners simply are not aware what they need to know around employment compliance, particularly around Award entitlements. A good example? Recent changes to record keeping obligations when offering award-covered employees an annualised salary.

One solution? Bare Bones Consulting’s HR Health Check. Our HR audit provides an objective examination of your HR policies, procedures and systems. Our goal is to look for existing problems and identify ways you can manage your HR risk by ensuring:

• you are compliant and following best practice within employment law;
• your employees are being paid correctly; and
• you stay up to date with the latest employment laws and trends for your business.

Our HR Health Check provides you an objective evaluation of your HR function and where to make improvements for maximum effect. We’ll identify issues before they become real problems and, with our genuine HR expertise, we can offer you simple, cost effective and practical solutions for your business, people and budget.

You could do it yourself but let’s be real: most small businesses do not have the inhouse HR expertise or the available resources and time to do it right.

Like to know more? Check out our HR audit page. Then give us a call. We think you’ll find a HR Health Check for your business is simpler than  you might think!