National Australia Bank has acknowledged underpayments to 65,999 current and former staff covering the period from 1 October 2012 to the present, surpassing $136.3 million, and has paid at least $155 million so far. The Fair Work Ombudsman announced the undertaking on 12 November, HRD reported.
The bank brought the matter to the regulator's attention in late 2019 after errors were found when it implemented its enterprise agreement at the time. When NAB rolled out a new enterprise agreement in 2024, it found the original problems had not been adequately resolved and workers were still being underpaid. Workers spanning casual, part-time and full-time arrangements in all states and territories were affected, covering positions including customer support advisors, home lending bankers, branch managers and project managers.
Per-worker back-payments vary widely, running from under $5 at the low end to over $87,000 at the high end, and averaging around $1,934. In its notice about the undertaking, NAB acknowledged it had breached the Fair Work Act 2009, with the contraventions relating to the National Employment Standards and to its enterprise agreements from 2011, 2014, 2016 and 2024.
Beyond the back-payments, NAB must pay $2 million to the Commonwealth Consolidated Revenue Fund as a contrition payment. No previous Fair Work Ombudsman enforceable undertaking has included a contrition payment as large as $2 million, The Nightly reported.
Fair Work Ombudsman Anna Booth said she found it particularly disappointing to observe extended, large-scale underpayments at a well-resourced employer that had negotiated its own legally binding enterprise agreement but failed to verify its payroll systems could actually give effect to those terms before they took effect. Booth said workplace law compliance is a responsibility that spans the whole organisation, and that preparation for a new enterprise agreement's pay requirements must start early enough to ensure workers are paid what they are owed. Sarah White, NAB's group executive people and culture, apologised to affected workers, characterising the underpayments as unintended and stating that the bank takes its payroll obligations seriously and will keep remediating those who were affected.
Under the undertaking, NAB must establish a steering committee chaired by its group executive people and culture to plan and implement any future enterprise agreement, and must submit to at least two independent compliance audits. A third-party auditor will conduct at least two audits to assess NAB's compliance under the undertaking.
Reporting: The Nightly, HRD
Written by Pick & Scroll News from the reporting and documents linked above.
