On Friday, the NSW zoo operator for Taronga and Western Plains zoo also revealed it had underpaid staff $2.6 million after auditing its payroll systems.
Fair Work Ombudsman (FWO) Sandra Parker said the agency had agreed to an enforceable undertaking, rather than civil penalties, for Suncorp because the bank had co-operated and shown a strong commitment to rectifying underpayments.
“This matter demonstrates the importance of employers placing a high priority on compliance, including with all clauses in their enterprise agreements,” she said.
“Suncorp’s incorrect application of particular clauses has led to underpayment of basic employee entitlements and a large back payment bill.”
Earlier this week Ms Parker voiced frustration and disappointment that some big companies had taken so long to uncover payroll errors given she had notified the boards of the ASX 100 to conduct audits in 2019.
She has promised to take a tough approach to companies that have not done audits and are later found to have underpaid staff.
Suncorp picked up its errors early on by conducting an internal review of its agreement conditions in November 2019 with support from Deloitte. It engaged Ernst and Young to verify the outcome.
It found advisers, assessors, customer support staff, technical staff, supervisors and managers were all short-changed and individual underpayments went as high as $54,951. The average underpayment was $1687 per employee.
The underpayments arose in part because Suncorp relied on a “self-service” approach where employees themselves had to claim extra entitlements above their ordinary hours.
The bank also inconsistently classified staff as “rostered employees”, which in its agreements defined staff who regularly worked outside ordinary hours.
The errors led to failures to pay overtime, shift loadings, weekend penalty rates, leave and public holidays loadings, minimum rates, redundancy and meal allowances. It also incorrectly paid out long service leave and notice periods.
The bank initially estimated its underpayment between $40 million and $70 million, which it said it would recognise in its 2020 financial year.
However, its total underpayment was $26 million in wages and entitlements along with $4.5 million in interest and $1.4 million in superannuation.
Its “contrition payment” to the Commonwealth of $520,000 amounts to 2 per cent of the $26m underpayment.
According to its enforceable undertaking signed with the FWO, the bank has since upgraded its payroll system to integrate correct agreement interpretations with roster data.
It had also launched compulsory training for managers and employees on record keeping, pay and leave and committed to annual compliance audits with agreement conditions over the next two years.
“Under the EU, Suncorp has committed to stringent measures to ensure its employee are paid correctly in the future” Ms Parker said.
Finance Sector Union national secretary Julia Angrisano said “it’s up to companies, not staff to make sure workers are being paid properly”.
“Calling this rip-off a ‘misunderstanding of appropriate entitlements under a self-service process’ is nothing but a cop out.”
Taronga underpayment ‘a bit rich’
Meanwhile, Taronga Western Plains Zoo found it had underpaid casual staff $2.6 million after undertaking a “proactive audit” of its interpretation of the award and how this applied through a new payroll system, introduced in 2021.
Taronga incorrectly calculated casual workers were not entitled to a 15 per cent loading on weekdays.
Taronga chief executive Cameron Kerr said he was deeply sorry to workers who had been underpaid.
“I offer my sincere apologies to those current and former staff who have been impacted,” he said.
The “proactive audit” followed a snap strike by zoo workers in Dubbo last year after they complained the payroll system had underpaid them and taken away leave entitlements.
Australian Workers Union NSW secretary Tony Callinan said Taronga had refused for 18 months to accept there was a problem with their payroll system and only “reluctantly” agreed to engage an external auditor after workers stopped work.
“It’s a bit rich for Taronga to come out today and claim to be self reporting an underpayment when the payroll audit would have never happened if not for AWU members’ taking action in November 2022,” he said.