B&E Poultry Holdings – a repeat offender when it comes to underpaying staff – has again been reprimanded by Fair Work, having to backpay a group of three Taiwanese backpackers.
The backpackers were in Australia on 417 working holiday visas and employed to work at a facility in Ormeau in Queensland.
They started work at 2.30am and regularly clocked up to 60 hours a week for a flat rate of $17 an hour. The Fair Work Ombudsman found they should have been paid between $21 and $33 an hour, depending on their shift.
The workers, employed as casuals, were short-changed $12,347, $7,702 and $5,513 respectively, as well as being underpaid casual loadings, shift penalties, overtime rates and weekend penalty rates.
The employer – B&E Poultry Holdings– has previously been required to back-pay tens of thousands of dollars to other staff members, and since 2012, the Fair Work Ombudsman has required the company to hand over more than $140,000 to 15 other employees.
As a result of the latest contraventions, the company has entered into an Enforceable Undertaking with the Fair Work Ombudsman as an alternative to litigation. It has reimbursed all outstanding entitlements, issued a written apology for the breaches, and posted a workplace notice advising other employees of its contraventions, giving a commitment that such conduct will not occur again.
The company is also required to undertake workplace relations training on employee entitlements under the Fair Work Act and to engage independent, external consultants to review and report on its compliance at six monthly intervals for the next two years.