Wage remediation program

The University is committed to complying with its obligations to staff, including under the relevant enterprise agreements, and ensuring everyone is paid correctly for work they perform.

The University has been making payments since 2021 in respect of practices that did not accord with our enterprise agreement. In 2021, the Vice-Chancellor emailed all staff to apologise and encourage any casual staff member who believes they might have been underpaid to contact the University.

In addition, the University commissioned a comprehensive review of how current and past employees have been paid for work performed under the 2013 and 2018 Enterprise Agreements. This review covers all faculties and Chancellery.

The University engaged external providers to help apply the additional resources required to prioritise this program and take an independent view of the situation.

Work continues on this review and the University is making further remediation payments as required.

Some of the steps taken to conduct this review include:

• analysing a range of data from systems including the employee masterfile (Themis), payslips, timesheet records and other data sources for current and former employees against the relevant provisions of the 2013 and 2018 Enterprise Agreements;
• creating a data analytics model to compare the payments made to employees against payments required to be made under the 2013 and 2018 enterprise agreements based on the University's records of hours worked; and
• conducting numerous validation checks to ensure the accuracy of the data and the calculations.

We are committed to remediating the situation and strengthening the University’s governance structures, systems and processes.

Some steps we've taken include:

• implementing a range of system and payroll improvements to ensure ongoing compliance;
• introducing additional compulsory training for staff and managers;
• establishing new roles in faculties and central divisions to support and reinforce employment practices; improving audit and monitoring processes to identify potential risk areas before payments are made;
• implementing changes to our systems and processes for recording and payment of time and attendance; and
• commencing a major enterprise resource planning (ERP) project that will include the implementation of a new payroll system.

If you are due to receive a back payment, you will receive an email from our external provider, Deloitte, who are assisting with this work. This email will invite you to register onto a Secure Employee Portal where you can access specific details about your individual payment. The email will come from Unimelbreview@deloitte.com.au

If this attempt is not successful or if we have no email address for you, we will try other means of communication, such as text message or mail.

The outcome letter you will receive via the portal includes, in Schedule A, the specific period for which your payment relates. Further details, including a breakdown of your payment can also be found in Schedule A and in your payslip. Both these supporting documents will be available via the Secure Employee Portal.

Timing of payments

Our entitlements review is being conducted on a progressive basis, so that as calculations are completed for specific entitlements and employee cohorts, those employees are paid at the earliest opportunity.

Not all back payments will be made at the same time, so you may receive notification of payments relating to different entitlements and time periods as the review progresses.

To calculate your payment, we have used historical rates (i.e. the 2013 Enterprise Agreement or 2018 Enterprise Agreement rates that applied to you at the relevant time the work was performed) and applied simple interest on the payments and to the applicable employer superannuation contribution. Interest has been applied to the rates of pay applicable at the date the claimed hours were worked and to the applicable employer superannuation contribution.

Interest has accrued and been paid at the higher of the two half-yearly Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA) cash rates in the relevant financial year plus 4% per annum across each financial year of the review period, up to the end of the month subsequent to when your cohort of payments have been finalised. This means you will be paid more interest for back payments owing since, for example, 2018 than the back payments owing since 2019, because interest has been applied over a longer period.

By way of example, the RBA cash rate for the second half of 2020 was 0.25%. For the first half of 2021, it was 0.10%. We have applied an interest rate of 4.25% for all payments owing in this financial year.

Superannuation has been calculated at the applicable superannuation rate for 'ordinary time earnings' (OTE). Both the superannuation and interest on superannuation will be paid as a contribution to your superannuation fund.