Central Queensland University Pays $1.3 Million in Underpaid Staff Entitlements

Central Queensland University (CQU) has been forced to pay $1.3 million in entitlements to former and current staff.

Underpayments, which date back to the 2012 enterprise agreement, were reported by the university to the Fair Work Ombudsman after the discrepancies were discovered in April 2023.

The figure is equivalent to an average of about $1,250 per staff member.

In a statement, the ombudsman said one staff member had been underpaid more than $63,000.

The university told the ombudsman a poorly set-up payroll system was to blame, and that a heavy reliance on manual processes led to staff errors.

The National Tertiary Education Union's Queensland secretary, Michael McNally, said the university should have already invested in its payroll system.

"Often, the university will sort out problems for the individual staff member when you raise an issue, but getting them to do a systemic review has taken the ombudsman getting involved," he said.

The underpayments stretched across the university's academics, professional staff and vocational trainers.

CQU has signed an enforceable undertaking with the ombudsman.

Vice-chancellor Nick Klomp said the university had set up a dedicated "wage integrity" team.

"We wanted to be really open and saying, 'You know what? We've done the wrong thing,'" Professor Klomp said.

He also blamed some underpayments on "complicated awards" and some supervisors' lack of awareness of entitlements.

"We'll continue reporting to [the ombudsman] but our systems and training will really ensure this is very, very unlikely to happen again," he said.

The ombudsman said 875 former and current employees had already had their wages returned by CQU, with another 163 waiting.

The union said $311 million had been recovered nationwide through enforceable undertakings or fines by the ombudsman since it began cracking down on wage underpayments in 2022.

Universities across Queensland, New South Wales, Tasmania and the Northern Territory are among the 13 to sign enforceable undertakings with the ombudsman.

The University of Queensland repaid more than $7.8 million to more than 10,000 casual staff for underpayments spanning seven years.

Mr McNally acknowledged the CQU figure was "at the lower end of the scale".

"They really should have ensured that they had the systems in place and that people were paid every dollar that they're owed."

As part of the enforceable undertaking, CQU will be required to make a "contrition payment" of $30,000 with a future payment of up to $100,000, which the ombudsman will distribute to its approved recipient organisations.