FIXED-SCOPE ENGAGEMENT
The WA Wage Compliance Audit
Intentional underpayment of wages is now a criminal offence in Australia. The practical protection for a small employer is a documented, proactive audit - evidence that you checked, before anyone else did.
WHY NOW
Wage theft is a crime. Honest mistakes are still expensive.
Since the criminalisation of intentional underpayment under the Fair Work Act, the stakes of getting pay wrong have changed in kind, not just degree. For small businesses, the Voluntary Small Business Wage Compliance Code provides a practical safe harbour: an employer who can show a genuine, documented effort to pay correctly will not be referred for criminal prosecution over an honest mistake.
The key word is documented. Good intentions are not evidence. A wage audit performed properly, dated, and kept on file is.
Most underpayments we find are not deliberate. They come from a handful of recurring causes: an employee classified against the wrong award or the wrong level within it, a "salary covers everything" arrangement that does not actually cover the penalty rates and overtime it absorbs, junior rates applied past the birthday that ends them, or allowances that were never mapped in the first place. Every one of those is findable and fixable - and dramatically cheaper to fix voluntarily than after a claim.
An audit you commission is a management tool. An audit the Fair Work Ombudsman commissions is something else entirely.
SCOPE
What the audit covers
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01
Classification review. Every role mapped to the correct industrial instrument and classification level, on a duties-based analysis - not the job title on the payslip
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02
Rate verification. Actual pay tested against the current award minimums, including penalties, overtime, allowances and any set-off arrangements in the contracts
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03
Exposure and evidence. Back-pay exposure quantified where it exists, and a dated evidence pack showing the check was made - your due diligence record
Fixed price by headcount band. WA state system and national system employers both covered - we confirm which one you are in first, because in WA that question decides everything downstream.
What you receive
DELIVERABLES
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Classification determinations
A written determination for each role: the applicable instrument, the classification level, the minimum entitlements, and the buffer or shortfall against actual pay. Every determination cites the current award clause it relies on.
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Pay exposure summary
A single document your accountant and your lawyer can both read: total exposure if any, employee by employee, with the remediation options priced and ranked.
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Remediation plan
Corrected classifications, contract amendments, back-pay calculations and the communication plan for affected employees. Fixing it properly, once.
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Compliance evidence pack
The dated record that the audit was performed, what it found and what was done about it - the practical demonstration of the proactive conduct the Small Business Wage Compliance Code describes.
START HERE
Know your position before someone else defines it for you
Request a fixed quote for your headcount. We respond within one business day.