The University of Tasmania has agreed to back pay more than 10,000 workers after underpaying them for over a decade.
The university has signed an enforceable undertaking with the Fair Work Ombudsman, committing to $21.4 million in repayments, including interest and superannuation.
Most of those affected were casual professional and academic staff across campuses in Hobart, Launceston, Burnie and Sydney.
The underpayments occurred between March 2014 and July 2025, with individual amounts ranging from less than $6 to more than $280,000.
According to the Fair Work Ombudsman, the university’s biggest failing was not paying casual staff for the minimum three-hour shifts required under its enterprise agreements.
Staff were also short-changed on penalty rates, overtime, public holiday pay, leave entitlements and a range of allowances.
Poor governance and payroll system failures were at the heart of the problem, according to the Fair Work Ombudsman.
The university also broke the law by failing to keep accurate records of hours worked by casuals.
UTAS uncovered the problem after the Fair Work Ombudsman wrote to all Australian universities in 2020, asking them to review their compliance with workplace laws.
The university then conducted its own investigation and reported the breaches in 2021.
Fair Work Ombudsman Anna Booth said an enforceable undertaking was appropriate because UTAS had cooperated and shown genuine commitment to fixing the mistakes.
“UTAS deserves credit for acknowledging its breaches and the underlying issues and committing significant time and resources to put in place corrective measures that will ensure both full remediation of impacted staff and improved compliance for the future,” she said.
Booth said the case highlighted the risks of poor oversight.
“The matter serves as a warning of the significant long-running problems that can result from an employer failing to have appropriate checks and balances to ensure workplace compliance,” she said.
“We expect universities to meet their legal obligations under their own enterprise agreements.”
Under the undertaking, the university must also pay a $175,000 contrition payment and complete two independent compliance audits.
Staff will receive training on workplace obligations and the audit and risk committee will now oversee Fair Work compliance.
UTAS has already paid most of the money owed and its review into any further underpayments is ongoing.
The settlement makes UTAS the eleventh Australian university to enter an enforceable undertaking since 2022, when the Fair Work Ombudsman made sector compliance a priority.
Others include Monash University, the University of Sydney, the University of Melbourne and the University of Technology Sydney.
