Hello.
My name's Santasha Nabananga Bamblet. I'm a proud Yr the
Order Kerni Whalbury and a waddery woman. And before we get started on She's on the Money podcast, I would like to acknowledge the traditional custodians of the land of which this podcast is recorded on a wondery country, acknowledging the elders, the ancestors and the next generation coming through as this podcast is about connecting, empowering, knowledge sharing and the storytelling of you to make a difference for today and lasting impact for tomorrow.
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She's on the Money, She's on the Money.
Hello, and welcome to She's on the Money, the podcast for millennials who want financial freedom. My name is Georgia King, and joining me as she does agent every single Wednesday, is Miss Victoria Divine V.
How are we Georgia King? I am well, what about you?
Yeah, good girl. So today we are going to talk about employee rights. It is such a common concern in the community and it can be very overwhelming when you're in the middle of having your rights breached in the workplace. But you do have rights, which is what we're going to talk about today.
It's kind of helpful. Yeah, all right, so this episode is pretty basic stuff, but there are a lot of elements to discuss. Let's be honest. We want to get you thinking about your rights and encourage you to check out the links that are going to be published with
this episode to do more digging. If any of this has raised concerns for you about you and your workplace, which unfortunately, George, I'm seeing it all over TikTok, I'm seeing it all over Instagram at the moment, people being like, oh my gosh, my employer doesn't let me xyz and
it's blowing my mind. And I guess this is where this topic has come from, because I'm just going, well, people aren't being treated with the respect that they deserve, and it's not just respect, it's actually just basic human rights, and too many of us just take it as well. That's how it works. Like they're the employer, they've got the power. No sit down, seas like we are going to school you. At the end of this episode, you are going to be confident. You are going to be
telling your boss not to treat you like trash. And if your boss isn't treating you like trash, hopefully you can learn a few things. So if one of your mates is like, all right, well my boss is not being kind, you can be like, all right, sit down, I got you.
Let me let me talk, let me tell you. Yes exactly, So we're gonna be talking about industry awards and agreements, so branuation, oh and s unfair dismissal, the fair work Tribunal and so much more.
What a dream? You guys heard that list and we're like, wow, sexy g king tell me more. And honestly, sadly, sometimes employers are pretty backwards about coming forwards with your rights and they just don't do things that they are legally required to. And gee, you and I know that much of our community are very early on in their employment journey, so it's really easy to get taken advantage of. Sadly, did you know that you actually need to be paid
for meetings? And like, did you ever work in retail?
G not retail but hosspone?
Yeah? Did they ever make you come in early? Yeah?
But pizza party? Oh? Sorry, not early, but that was.
After we go to the States. Yeah, yeah, no, you needed to be paid for that, Nike, If that's a work meeting. Come in, you want to come in fifteen minutes early before you shift? Am I being paid? No? Well, I guess I don't need to be there there.
Oh I bloody you need some compensation. V. Let's start with work conditions. There are rules about what employees get at work, such as what hours they work, how often they have to take a break, et cetera, et cetera. Where is all of that stuff actually laid out?
So the rules are in lots of different places, such as an award or a registered agreement or even your employment contract, and an employee's minimum titlements are set out in the National Employment Standards, which is called the NEES for short, which is a registered agreement and can provide for other entitlements, but those entitlements can't be less than
what's in the NES. So gee, if you've got an employement agreement and it says you get one fifteen minute break, but the NES is you get a half hour break, you get a half hour break. It doesn't matter what it says in your employment contract that any s is the bare minimum. So if I were you and you feel like maybe your employment contract is a little bit more snug than it should be. I'd check that because the reality is that any s is the bare minimum.
If an award covers the employee, the entitlements can't be overall less than the award that exists. Employment contracts also can't reduce someone's entitlements under the NES, which is what I said before. But I've listed it down, so it's just going to harp on about it, and you can find employee pay rates or learn more about entitlements. You can go to fair Work dot gov dot au obviously g the link is going to be in the show notes.
Obviously. They also have a really good quiz on there to bed where you can test your knowledge on common employee entitlements, so that like flexible working arrangement, it's it's fine, you're gonna love.
It, no love, You'll get ten out of ten, thank you. But I also would prefer to just be treated properly not have to do a quiz to see if I know what my right.
Well, if anyone this thing is interested in the quiz, it's called the Workplace Basics Quiz, and you'll find feedback and links to helpful resources in there. A lot of fun. But you mentioned awards earlier.
I did what is not like a first award or a second award or a best like She's on the Money TITA Member of the Week, which you clearly own and get awarded every single week. But essentially, awards are legal documents that outline the minimum pay rates and conditions for our type of employment. There are actually heaps of these. There are more than one hundred different industry or occupation
awards that cover most people who work in Australia. And again we're going to plug the Fairwork website, but you can find yours at fairwork dot gov dot au, forward slash employment conditions, forward slash Awards. But I wouldn't type that in. I'd just go fair Work Awards, employment conditions and like google it and then it all come up. Yeah, quick hack. You can actually solve most things by googling it.
G And spoiler alert, I'm probably going to say fair Work about a million times in this episode because they are the og for information when it comes to anything pertaining to your rights at work. So get ready because you're probably going to get sick of it.
Stunning love it. Let's talk leave entitlements, see annual. That's all I can think of at the moment, who gets.
Again, we can get care is leave. All employees, except for casual employees, get paid annual leave, and the entitlement to annual leave actually comes from the NES. SO our National Employment Standards and Awards, enterprise agreements and other registered agreements can't offer less than the ANYS, which I've said before, but they can give you more. So that could be a nice little spicy bonus. Like if the nes says for your job that you get four weeks a year,
and your boss is like, well, actually we are for five. Well, well hurk, that's nice. That's different. That's unusual.
How much annual leave does an employee usually get?
So, as a standard for full time and part time employees, it's four weeks of annual leave per annum based on your ordinary hours of work, and then shift workers they might get up to five weeks of annual leave according to the NYS per year. Obviously, it's going to change, it's going to be different. And even if your employment contract says more than that, then great, wham bam, thank you ma'am. That's very exciting. But if it's less then it's a no for me.
Okay. There is also a stunning little leave calculator on our favorite fairwork website as well. If you are a title too, how does and you'll leave actually accumulate?
Okay, so before I answer that, I also want to go back to your little calculator because it sounds really sexy. Love a calculator. But you can also find your leave entitlements and how much and you'll leave you have on your pay sleep, so it should always keep track of that, and it will tell you usually in hours not days. It might be like, oh, you have four hours of annual leave, and you kind of accrue it that way, so check that. Then you can cross check it based
on that calculator. I think is probably the best way to do it. But let's go back to your question about annual leave and how it accumulates. So and youual ly accumulates from literally the first day you have of employment, even if you're in a probation period, so you don't have to wait to start getting annual leave, and leave accumulates gradually during the year, and any unused and you'll leave will and should roll over from year to year, so your employee can't be like you didn't use it.
G So we're just going to put it in the bin and start again. Yeap illegal not an option, and you'll leave accumulates when an employee is on paid leave as well, So if you're on paid annual leave and paid sick cares leave, you actually still accumulate and you'll leave community service leave, including jury duty, which I thought I was going to have to do. Yeah, I thought I was going to have to do a few years ago,
and then I got booted off your sad story. They just thought that I would be too emotional about a child issue. Oh they're not wrong. Would have been, so it was probably a good yeat. And also if you're on long service leave, you can accumulate it annually. Doesn't accumulate though, when you're on unpaid and you'll leave, yeah, because obviously like you're going into the negative. So that
kind of makes sense to me. Unpaid sick care is leave, or parental leave or unpaid family and domestic violent sleeve. So anything that's unpaid usually not accumulating any type of anual leave, but if you're being paid to be on leave, then yes, you are accruing. It is the tel D.
It's a good way of thinking of it. The sicklyve just a quick side note here, you're entitled to ten days or something like that per year out does that rollover or no?
It usually is just ten a year and it doesn't add up or roll over, And you also don't get paid out sick leave when you leave. It's just kind of a if you're not well and you need to take some time off, we can do that. Some employers will be a bit more flexible, and you know, gee, if you're really sick, they'll be like, just gone sickly if it's fine, or maybe they'll say, okay, well we need a doctor's certificate to give you further like it kind of is negotiable, but that in the NES is
the bare minimum on sick leave. Though, say you work in retail, I'm a bit jaded here, George, because I worked in retail for a very long time and I just feel like the manager I was on a little bit of a power trip that I didn't understand at that point in time. But in hindsight, I'm like, whoa victoria you put up with that ill? Your manager cannot make you come in if you say, hey, I am actually unwell, can't come into work today. They can't go oh, sorry,
we don't have anyone to cover your shift. George King, You're gonna have to do it. No, sorry, manage it. You're a manager, organize it. Yeah. Anyway, people are going to be really not happy with me in this episode, but I don't really care.
It's good. It's good VD. It's no secret superannuation is your favorite topic in the whole wide world.
And wedding planning. That's also very close to my heart at this point in time.
What to employers owe us when it comes to super Okay, so, if you're.
An employee, you're typically entitled to compulsory super contributions from your employer. Obviously there are different ways about it, but essentially, if you're over the age of eighteen, absolutely everybody gets paid super. Now, historically that wasn't the case. You had to meet a minimum criteria of how much you earn
every fortnight to actually accumulate it. But now everyone who is an adult that is working gets superannuation, which I think is thriller is xy and these super guaranteed contributions need to be a minimum amount based on your current super guarantee rate of your ordinary earnings, which is an absolute mouthful, but Essentially, George, that right now is ten and a half percent. So ten and a half percent of your ordinary earnings needs to be paid into your
superannuation up to what is called the maximum contribution base. Obviously, we're going to put in the show notes a link to the super guarantees rate from the ato's website, because I love that website as well. But at the end of the day, your super guarantee isn't going to be less than somebody else's. And if an employer says, oh, gee, well actually we only pay five percent super, no you don't, that's not an option.
Right, Okay, so you just mentioned some changes there, Va, did you say this is going to be more?
Oh yes, yeah, going up from here at my love. So essentially I did touch on it before because I really like getting ahead of myself. Last year, your super would have been a minimum of ten percent, and then this year, as of July twenty twenty two, it went up to ten and a half percent, and it's going to keep going up. I said before that my favorite thing about superannuation was that now everybody has access to it.
Prior to July first, twenty twenty two, you needed to be paid more than four hundred and fifty dollars in a month in addition to meeting all other eligibility criteria to be eligible for super. And now that has changed. But the super guarantee or the SG, which you might say on your pay sleep. I've had a few messages from that. She's on the money community asking me what SG on their pace slips is. It's super guarantee. It's
your superannuation. But essentially our super guarantee schedule is going up and it's going to progressively increase each year by point five percent to get to twelve percent by July twenty twenty five, which I think is very very sexy.
That is lovely. That's nice, very nice.
If I'm being honest, it's still not enough for women to retire comfortably. But that's another conversation we can have another day, George.
Key, Sure we will, so b when doesn't my employer have to make super contributions?
So if they're not your employer, So if you're like a freelancer and you do your tax return by you know, being a sole trader or a company, then it's actually up to you to pay your own superannuation. That should be built into your hourly rate, which is why freelancers usually get paid more than a per hour employee generally. But I looked on the ATO website and they also
do not have to pay you superannuation contributions. If you're paid to do work of a private or domestic nature for thirty hours or less each week.
What does that mean?
I don't know. It was on the ATO website, G King. If you're a non Australian resident and you're paid to do work outside Australia, which you're not an Australian resident, and you're working overseas, why would I just I was like, okay, mister Ato. The next is an Australian resident paid by a non resident employer for work done outside of Australia. I just you know, it's yeah, straight over my head
to Gking. If you're a senior foreign executive on a certain class of visa sure or you're temporarily working in Australia for an overseas employer and are covered by the superannuation provisions of a bi lateral social security agreement, So you know what all of that is actually telling me is no, nine point nine five percent of the time your employer should be paying your super unless you really resonated with any of those things that made no sense to us.
Perfect. There's also a tool VD to work out if you are eligible for Super Guarantee contributions on the ATO website.
It's way easier than that least I just read out, So probably go try.
That, and it's going to be in the show notes. Guys are to it. What do I do if I found out my employer hasn't been paying my super riot brier.
Yeah, you start a riot, k No, But literally what you're going to do is always check your superballance. So let's step back a little bit. We're not worried about people who aren't paying super yet, I actually am worried that you're not keeping track of your super. Your super is your money. As of this year, it is ten point five percent of your savings. Most of us aren't actually able to save that in our normal day to day life, but you're currently investing that. That's really important.
Care about it. Superannuation can paid on different basises, so your employer might choose to pay it monthly, but it does need to be paid at a minimum quarterly. So, for example, I pay our superannuation every single quarter because it's easier to just do it in a bulk lot, right, So it's not hard for your employer to do it either. G It's actually just as easy as paying a bill on be pay. So if they're saying it's complicated, it
is not. I will school them. But essentially, what I want to do before telling you what to do if they're not paying you super is actually just be across it. So many of us do not log into our super accounts. We either don't know how much we have, or we go, oh, it's probably about you know, twenty grand or thirty grand, but we're not actually paying any attention to whether the contributions are being made, Are they being invested, Are they
being invested in line with my values? Am I happy with the risk profile that has been chosen on my super account? Do I have more than one super account? Am I paying double fees? These are all questions that you need to ask yourself. And then furthering that, if you go and look, my friend and find that your employer has not been paying you super gee, that's when we riot okay. But also we are going to start
by having a conversation. We're gonna ask how they're paying Super when they're paying Super, or even if they're aware that they are legally required to pay Super and go, hey, guys, like, I don't know if you know this, but like, my super's not showing up. I feel like, gee, in these circumstances, it's easier to feign a little bit of ignorance and go, oh, my gosh, Gee, I don't really know how my Super
account works. But the other day I logged in and I realized, like, none of my contributions are going there. Could you just check what account they're going through? Maybe I've given you an old account that I've forgotten about, and I know that that we shouldn't have to do that, And I'm not saying that that's quoite the best way to do it, but you know, knowing that she's on the money community, knowing me, knowing you, that's an easier
in to go you're not paying my Super. Because it's also a very hard conversation to turn around and be like, gee, you're not paying me, Like that's messed up. So for me, let's find an easier way to start that conversation of like, oh, what account is it going into? And that my prompt them to scramble and actually pay it and be like, oh my gosh, our accounts the department messed up and they totally forgotten. It's definitely somebody else's fault, not mine.
But gee, I looked after you and I fixed it when bam, thank you, ma'am. I'll just keep track of that because that isn't on. But at least you're in the best possible circumstance. But two, really understanding your rights there, nobody cannot pay your super. If somebody is not paying you super, you can report it. If they haven't paid you super, they actually owe you interest on that money. So if they haven't paid you, they actually owe you
more than what the superannuation they missed was. So say last year, g I didn't pay your super five hundred bucks and the share market has performed at seven percent, Well, great, they also owe me seven percent on the five hundred dollars that wasn't invested, because it's not just the money I'm missing, it's the potential returns for my future retirement.
So that is actually really big. And if you do report it to the ATO, they can be fined in addition to that, so it's very very bad, And to be honest, people go to jail for not paying Super. It's not just a oh sorry I forgot it was a mix up. It's an actual offense. Yep, you could
go to the Slammer. So if you've talked to your employer and that hasn't solved the problem, which is really sad because his spicy insight into Victoria's life, I have had a few messages recently from people in my community, my local community, saying, ah, my employer hasn't paid me Super. The next step is to actually lodge a claim and report them to the ATO via their online platform. So if you just Google, obviously we're going to put the
link to the ATO website in the show notes. But if you just google ATO report no pay Superannuation, it will actually just come up immediately and you can go through that. It is super easy, and you'll let the ATO know about your unpaid Super, your late Super payments or incorrect payments to the wrong fund, and the ATO
will investigate it on your behalf. They take that stuff super seriously, like it's very easy to report, won't cost you anything, And to be honest, all you have to do is say I haven't been paid super Because the ATO has access to all your data, they can.
Check right, And so that is worth doing because you know a lot of the time people are like, uh, swim, but it's not going a couple of years ago.
No, No, that's your money, that's your real gem. And also like taking it a little bit of a step further. G sorry, if they've done that to you, they're doing it to other people. I know you might go, oh, it was only five hundred bucks, it was a couple of years. Oh, I can't be bothered. Great, you know better now, But those poor people that are currently working for that employer are probably being treated in exactly the
same way. And to be honest, I think, you know, in a kind of community way, we have an obligation to look after other people, and that's one of those obligations. Like I know you don't care about the five hundred bucks, but to me, it's principle. It's making sure that the future of that company is treated as well as you should.
Have been perfect, and I would care about the five hundred bucks. The on that note, let's put a little plug in it. But on the other side, we are going to be covering off some sad stats, grass yourself and also talking about all things oh and S. So don't go anywhere.
V.
Let's dive straight back in and talk about oh and S.
I heard sad. Stashdale has come to the table.
Here she is.
It's good to be here, So okay, be dramatic about it.
Did you know, No, we'll just be normal. Did you know VD an Australian worker is seriously injured every two to three minutes.
Really in twenty twenty two.
That is wild.
That's wild. I thought you were going to say, like in nineteen twenty four. No, say no, it's twenty twenty two. That's really sad.
Wait for it more sad stats to come. Tragically, one hundred and ninety four people were fatally injured at work in twenty twenty.
That's like a lot of people. I would really love to see the stats George of like what types of roles they're in, because that's wild.
Me too.
I'm sure they're not just walking into a podcast studio though.
And have thought so. Ninety six percent of worker fatalities into twenty twenty were male.
I'm not surprised by that, to be honest, Well, that speaks you would just speaks transtruction traits yeap. There were a total of one hundred and twenty thousand, three hundred and fifty five serious workers compensation claims in Australia in twenty nineteen to twenty twenty. This was an increase from one hundred and fourteen thousand, four hundred and thirty five claims in twenty eighteen to twenty nineteen. So that's bloody massive. Yeah, that's a lot.
And finally, the body stressing was the leading cause of serious worker is compensation claims in twenty nineteen to twenty twenty, accounting for thirty seven percent of all serious claims. Those are sad, sad stats, gal, really sad stats. I feel like they're need to boody roll out more of those work Work's safe at V. Let's talk more about OH and S. What is it, how is it laid out? And who enforces it? All?
Right?
So ohn S stands for Occupational Health and Safety and the Occupational Health and Safety Act of two thousand and four or just standard. Let's pretend we work in HR for a second. The Act g yeah, is the main workplace health and safety law in Australia. It sets out key principles, duties and rights all about h ands. Surprise, but you didn't see that coming.
Makes sense.
It exists to protect the health, safety and welfare of employees and other people at work. It aims to ensure that the health and safety of the public is not put at risk by work activities, which kind of just makes sense. But given the stats you gave, clearly not enough people are taking this seriously. Now, depending on your state, you'll either have work safe or safe work. Well, they just probably got a bit confused and then like really
stuck to their guns. It's safe work. Just a little marketing mistake there, but it is their job to protect the health, safety and welfare of employees and other people at work. It also aims to ensure that the health and safety of the public is not put at risk by work activities. So I feel like that just makes sense. But they will also Safe work or work Safe or whoever you think you are, will monitor and enforce compliance
with the OH and S Act and regulations. They will make recommendations to the Minister about the OH and S Act, regulations and compliance codes. Their job is to promote public awareness and discussion about occupational health, safety and welfare issues and their job is also to publish oh and s statistics, so maybe they're more legit stat scales than you are.
WHOA.
So you report incidents and make claims for injuries at work through work safe or safe work. The guys in New South Wales really just committed to it work safe none, no, no, it's safe work safe work. They're doing a parma parme. It's clearly a parmer. I'm not a year to argue with you. But if we got on the pod with some people from New South Wales, they'd say parme. You know what, we counsel.
Them v on that light note. Let's now talk about discrimination. What's going on there.
It's not when somebody thinks it's a parmi and you
don't like them. But under the Fair Work Act of two thousand and nine, it is unlawful for a workplace to discriminate against full time, part time and casual employees, probationary employees, apprentices, trainees, and individuals employed for fixed periods of time or task based on the following arguably anybody, but based on race, color, sex, sexual orientation, age, physical and mental disability, marital status, family or care as responsibilities, pregnancy, religion,
political opinion, national extraction, or social origin. And it is unlawful to refuse to hire a prospective employee based on one of the attributes that I just listed off really quickly. Where an investigation finds that the employer has or had discriminatory practices that are linked to adverse actions for employees or prospective employees, the fair work ombanesman might take enforcement action, which I think is very fair.
Okay, what do you mean by adverse action though?
Be okay? So adverse action taken by an employer includes doing things, or threatening, or organizing any of the following I've written a list, so sit down for this one. Dismissing an employee, injuring an employee in their employment, altering an employee's position to their detro discriminating between one employee and other employees, refusing to employ a prospective employee, or discriminating against a prospective employee on the terms and conditions
in the offer of employment. So it's lengthy.
Is bullying, harassment, and sexual harassment unlawful? As well?
Is Georgia King. Bullying and harassment, including sexual harassment, are serious concerns for literally any workplace and if bullying or harassment is linked to one of the attributes that I listed just before, so for example, like race, or sex or religion, then it may be unlawful discrimination and the Fair Work Gobordsman has the power to deal with the discrimination complaints. So when I say that they could literally take you to court. It's not little and they're like, oh,
wrap over the nungles. We gave you this sign that said you were naughty. No, it's like legally enforceable. And sexual harassment at work can be a form of serious misconduct and can also be a valid reason for dismissal under the Fair Work Act. So the Fair Work Commission or the FWC also has the power to issue orders to stop sexual harassment or bullying in the workplace. Obviously we are going to link that one in the show notes as well, but that is FWC dot gov dot
au for more infogking. Obviously, if we're talking about this, this is really serious. But I feel like so many times we don't value ourselves in a way that we should when we're going through circumstances like this. But if this is happening to you or someone that you know, you can actually go to the fair work obordsman work safe or safe work or whatever the hell you're calling them, or more importantly, g if you're being bullied and harassed and your safety is at risk, you can go to
the police. Like, this is not a small thing, even if it's happening in your workplace and you are being paid to be there. If your safety is at risk, I would literally march down to the police station. Because I don't think enough of us take this really seriously. It is a really serious issue. It needs to be taken as such.
Would you say the first step before any of those steps would be going to HR.
Or just just can't condestion And it really depends on who it is as well. Let's be honest, Like, if you know, we're in a big organization and it's a big corporate and they have a HR department, obviously going to the HR department would be my port of call. To be honest, I'd probably go to my manager first and talk about it if it's a colleague, But if it's my manager, I'd go to HR and go from there. But I think one of the things that we need
to be super aware of. You know, this isn't a nice thing to say, but organizations don't hire HR to look after you, Georgia, like your employer didn't hire HR to make sure that Georgia King is protected. They hired HR to make sure that the business is protected. And as much as we go and HR are delightful, people like some of my best friends work in HR, it's
not a problem. But they're hired by the organization to protect the organization from any issues that arise, and that means obviously supporting people through claims to make sure that there's no ulterior outcome for the business. But if something's happening and HR aren't doing their job, not just drop it.
It's go to fair work. It's take it further, because if they're dismissive of you or not treating you in the way that you deserve one, I'm sometimes not surprised, and I really shouldn't be, because you know that's the way it works. But fair work exists for a reason, and that's because the business is going to protect the business at the end of the day. J So going to fair work is something that I don't think we should be as scared of as possible. And on that note,
Georgia King taking notes is massive. One thing that is going to you know, pay dividends if you're in a circumstance where you're being bullied or going through some kind of workplace harassment is journaling and keeping tabs on literally everything. One of the best ways I have seen to do
this is actually just send yourself an email. Not from your work email that would be silly, but go into your personal email and send yourself emails of just like maybe just like a file note of like today I had a meeting with Georgia and she said XYZ, and then I said this, and this is the outcome of that. Like,
they don't have to be formalized notes. But the reason I like it in email is purely because it's also time stamped, so if anything ever comes up and you need to provide it one you can just print off or send off the you know, the emails to fair work to be like, yes, I tracked it, here's the information. But two, our memories are not as kind to us as they should be, and sometimes we forget the detail or what they said, or you said something like this
and it offended me. But like in the moment, I would just track it, shoot myself an email, make sure that I've got it on record, and those time stamps can come in handy. I hate that I have to say this because these are the realities of some workplaces here in Australia. But I think keeping ourselves safe is primo and it's the most important thing. But also, what's
the worst that can happen. You don't use those notes, great, well, just delete them later if you know they're not useful at some point because you've got the outcome that you needed from your workplace. But journal everything, notarize everything, and if possible, like take as much detail down as as possible.
When you said the don't do it from your work email, ye, can our employees go through our EA?
Yes, of course they can. Of course they can. Yeah, of course they can. And yeah, okay, so it'll be in your employment contract. But nine times out of ten, in your employment contract it'll say that that email is owned by the company, not by you. Like Georgia, she's on the money dot com dot you. I've never been through it, because you know what, I don't care what you send g But also if something you know detrimental happened,
I might need to go through your emails. If you're the one bullying another employee, and they've said, oh, Georgia King sent me this abusive email. I'm going to go find it. I'm going to go look for it. And a lot of employers, even if you delete it and delete it from your deleted box, they'll have a server somewhere that has it all backed up. I say that because I do, because I'm an employer who my IT
company said this is how you set it up. This is what you do to protect yourself as an employer, and I go, yeah, okay, no problems if that's the process.
But essentially all of the email addresses that you know she's on the money owns are owned technically by me, and then I can audit at any point I like, and I'm actually telling you to send it from your personal email to yourself, not because I think they're gonna audit it, but like, what if you get fired or what if you leave and then don't have access to those notes. I just want you to always have access
to them. So that was my importance. But good point. Yes, they can audit anything on your computer, anything on internal messengers, like if you've got Microsoft teams, like, they can see all of those messages. So yeah, if you want to have a personal conversation with a friend or a colleague, I would honestly yeah, have it offline, take it to text messages, take it to Facebook messenger, take it to Instagram, take it anywhere except a workplace platform.
Let Zuckerburg deal with it.
Yeah, let' zuckerburg deal. Let's move snapchat it so it deletes later.
Tell me more about the Fair Work Commission. Who actually are they?
All? Right?
So, the Fair Work Commission good eggs, doing good things. They are Australia's workplace tribunal and they create awards, proof enterprise agreements and help resolve issues that happen at work. They hear cases of unfair dismissal and rule outcomes. And they have tons of really good resources on their website too, which link obviously awards and enterprise agreements which you said before, information on unfair dismissal, and places where you can get
legal help and advice. And there's actually heaps of links for businesses too, so that they know that they're doing the right thing.
Perfect, Let's move on and chat about unfair dismissal and unlawful termination. I've heard it is really hard to get fired.
Is that true? Maybe I don't know, employee, maybe you've never had this issue before. But essentially, dismissal means that the employer is telling the employee that they don't have a job anymore. So they might say you're fired, or you're terminated, or you're leaving next week. But essentially dismissal means that it wasn't the employee's decision to leave the role. It was the employer's decision. They could fire an employee because they're not performing their job to the level that's required.
That doesn't make it unfair, but there's different reasons why obviously, Or they could tell their employee that their positions now redundant now or on a future date. In some cases, if the employers pay your forces an employee to resign, that also could be unfair dismissal. So if you know you're being pushed into quitting and they're not saying, quote, you're fired, that could actually still be unfair dismissal because you didn't feel like you had any other choice but to quit.
And the difference between dismissal and unfair dismissal, what actually is that, Like, what makes a dismissal unfair.
So a dismissal isn't always unfair, Like if an employee is maybe not up to scratch and not meeting the competencies of a role and they've been trying and trying, and they're like, look, this is just lucy, you're not fulfilling your role as a dog. You're gonna have to leave. It's just not working out. Like, that doesn't mean it's unfair, Like, not every dismissal is unfair, even if you feel that way, Like you might be so pissed off and you might be so upset that you've lost your role, but that
doesn't mean that it wasn't unjustified or undocumented. And in some situations it is actually fair to end an employee's employment, Like, I know that sucks to hear, but sometimes.
You could be.
Justice first. Yeah, that you just might not be the right fit. Right, But when an employee dismisses an employee, the law says a few things. It says you should not dismiss an employee if it is harsh, unjust or unreasonable. You should not make an employee redundant if it is not a genuine redundancy, like I can't turn around and be like, oh, the role's redundant, Lucy, and then hire someone the next week for the same role, because that's
not a genuine redundancy. And it should always follow the Small Business Fair Dismissal Code if they are a small business, or there's another code for bigger businesses as well. There's a little bit more flexibility from my understanding for small businesses, but it doesn't mean that they get out scot free, like you can't just fire people willing nearly. The Unfair Dismissal Checklist is obviously one of the links in our EP, so go back and have a look at that. But
essentially unfair dismissal. I guess the TLD are here as well. Is it could be an unfair dismissal We said this, but if you felt like you had no other option but to quit.
Yeah, okay, perfect fee d. That is all we have time for today.
What a dream.
Just before we do go, the guys, just a couple of notes, please go back and listen to our episode on how to have difficult Conversations with your boss. That one is super helpful if you are having issues at your workplace and if you do think you're being messed with. Then there are so many places to go, as we've mentioned multiple times in today's episodes. So hit those show notes.
Baby, they're good show notes.
But choose to Analisa.
Choose to Annalisa for pulling all of that together. But you know, as you said, unfortunately that's all we have time for today. So now it's time for the boring but important stuff.
Jane, let's do it. Remember, guys at the advice shared on She's on the Money is general in nature and does not consider your individual circumstances. She's on the Money exists purely for educational purposes and should not be relied
upon to make an investment or a financial decision. And we promise Victoria Divine and She's on the Money are authorized representatives of in Focused Securities Australia Proprietly Limited ABN for seven zero nine seven seven nine seven zero four nine for sale two three six five two straight having the weak Fridays