Time and time again wage theft pops up and it’s treated like a civil matter. And sure enough execs say sorry, cop a slap on the wrist and move on.
This would have to be one of the biggest corporate thefts in Australian history. Imagine what would happen if woollies failed to pay the tax office $300 million
Is it time wage thieves are jailed?
How about you two attempt to write something critical about Woolworth's
I have. I think it is unlawful and they should be punished.
You want people to take a side based on what is up and down then advocate for harsher punishment based on the position you perceive them to be on.
We carry the same standards for everyone. If you want jail terms for wage "theft", be ready to be served with a jail term when you fail to pay for some form of service for one reason or another.
No one here is supporting Woolies nor any company for paying below agreed contract. I hope they are made to pay up with interest.
We carry the same standards for everyone.
With all due respect, I don't think this is true. In the current issue, both of you have chosen to belittle the comments made by those who are critical of Woolworths' actions and HighAndDry up-votes the comments made by those who are directly or indirectly supporting Woolworths. You guys typically gravitate towards defending systems of governance and power where greed is the driving force and profit is more important than people. Please correct me if I'm wrong, but that's the impression I've received from the past few months.
be ready to be served with a jail term when you fail to pay for some form of service for one reason or another
If that's truly the way you both see this issue, then that explains a lot. Drawing a parallel between an individual owing money and a large corporation owing many millions? Oh, please! How much damage can you or I cause by breaking employment law? Not much, I suspect. How about a huge employer like Woolworths? Hundreds of millions. The level of punishment for a crime should reflect the amount of damage caused by it, wouldn't you agree?
Maybe it would be beneficial to point out that most people around the world are aware that there are a different set of rules for the elite and those for the poor. This can cover issues like tax "minimisation", law creation and enforcement, influence in politics, influence and treatment in the media, etc. I suppose the current poll results are a reflection of the disgust that most people have towards the injustices we perceive. By the way, I'm not advocating for harsher punishment, nor did I vote in the poll. I would only form an opinion if I actually knew what the existing sentencing guidelines are :-P Amongst all these comments, I haven't seen anyone mention what they are.
@kahn: If you don't want to be criticized, try making less glaring mistakes in your logic.
Right now all you have is a bunch of well intentioned drivel.
@HighAndDry: You're doing it again. Are you really incapable of self-reflection or change? I'm asking you nicely - try giving us one comment against what Woolworths has done. You can even do it while belittling me if that makes you feel more comfortable.
@kahn: There are a lot of valid criticisms of what Woolies has done here. You've just magically managed to miss them all.
And no, I don't feel like doing your homework for you. Pay more attention in class.
It's a misnomer.
This is typical.
There is a two tier justice system in Australia.
One is for the wealthiest people operating the largest businesses. The other is for everyone else.
Recent examples of this are the Commonwealth Bank laundering $700 million for drug dealers and terrorists or VW killing people by flaunting emissions standards. No one went to jail. They both made money after paying the cost of doing business fine that is described as being a penalty.
And nothing is going to change if the Laberal Parties continue being chosen to rule.
Tsk tsk, it looks like you're a bit out of the loop.
Edit: oops, it looks like you just meant Australia.
the Commonwealth Bank laundering $700 million for drug dealers
A good proportion of that may have just been Scrooge McDuck depositing their weekly income.
Employers that intentionally underpay worker, and that underpay workers through a misunderstanding or misinterpretation of an industry award are two separate situations.
One should have a look at the Retail Workers award; there are so many scales of wages and scales within scales it is a nightmare to pick your way through.
Unfortunately ‘being hard’ should not justify theft imho. Part of any business plan should be getting advice on compliance matters. Same as going to an accountant for navigating the hard tax system.
Good thing it's not actually theft then.
Well that’s the question. Should it be. Many say yes, some say no. Change is slow. We live in a democracy so it may happen.
@Vote for Pedro: Right now, in our democracy, we've decided that it's not a crime. Does that make it clearer?
@Vote for Pedro: For thinking that the current laws, which say it's not a crime, are a valid reflection of the population's decision made through the democratic process?
Please do and try to explain your brilliant thought process for me.
@HighAndDry: You chose to involve yourself in this discussion about whether it should be a crime. You do have a habit of trying to impose your views through strawman arguments and whataboutism.
@Vote for Pedro: I'm not the one thinking the currently democratically arrived position is somehow wrong and trying to impose my views on the criminal justice system.
@HighAndDry: We. All. Get. That. It’s. Currently. Not. A. Crime! But, and this might surprise you, we’re allowed to have a discussion about whether it should be.
That’s what this topic is about. The future.
@Vote for Pedro: Strawmanning is a favourite of H&D technique. Literally incapable of stopping, even when it's repeatedly pointed out.
@HighAndDry: The laws were made well before this, 7 eleven, Coles/SDA and (searching Google): https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.smh.com.au/business/workpla…
So they are probably due for a change.
Also, judging by the poll so far… If there was a nationwide vote on whether or not underpaying team members should be considered theft… I know what would win.
@Soluble: Would you believe that this one thread isn't a representative sample of the Australian electorate?
@HighAndDry: Ignore the first half, and comment on the 'also' good job. You comment on every single comment in this post trying to justify your views… But ok.
@Soluble: I'm not sure what the first part was trying to say to be honest. Yes, existing laws are all made in the past. And they stay effective (absent a sunset clause) until they're repealed or amended.
There's nothing to say a law is less valid because it's old. Murder has been a crime for a long time and I'd hope that doesn't change just because of that.
"Wage theft" as a term is people trying to use emotive and factually inaccurate language to influence a debate because they've run out of actual arguments. No one who uses, agrees with, or condones the term can ever accuse anyone else of intellectual dishonesty.
@HighAndDry: Seriously? The first part literally says the laws are probably due for a change? But if you can't understand that then you've probably missed the point of the entire thread.
@HighAndDry: Interestingly, a forum post on OzBargain will prompt discussion about how people who participate in the discussion (or vote) feel. It doesn’t even give a view on how OzBargain users as a whole feel.
We would only be able to extrapolate results if we had more data on OzBargain users and participants in the discussion. But I get that. All you are trying to do is deflect discussion from the question about whether the law should change.
@Vote for Pedro: I've repeatedly said I'm against debtors prisons so I can't help you if you still can't understand my views here.
@HighAndDry: Again, irrelevant and off topic. Attempting to dilute the issue by making it a wide ranging catch all situation.
are a valid reflection of the population's decision made through the democratic process?
You give people too much credit when it comes to the democratic process. As if most people don't just vote for the same part over and over because "that's all they know", or place their vote based on what's in it for them only. Most people would be hard [pressed to name any laws beyond the the most simple stuff.
@smartazz104: Oh I have zero faith in people following and actually productively engaging in our democratic system. But unless we move to an authoritarian government, we have to play along with this fiction that the current legal and political system is a valid reflection of people's democratic wishes.
For thinking that the current laws, which say it's not a crime, are a valid reflection of the population's decision made through the democratic process?
Ah yes, and that's why laws never change, of course, how silly of VfP to have missed that [eyeroll].
As others have hinted at, if these payment systems were simply innocently mismanaged, then should we see a roughly equal number of overpayments as underpayments. Maybe there are some overpayments and we just don't see them in the media, but I suspect they represent a small percentage of "mistakes".
Not really. The function of a finance division is to drive costs down. I.e. Monitor increasing costs and decreasing revenues.
You would be surprised at how cobbled together finance systems are at big companies.
In most case finance departments are just going through a balance sheet and looking at the costs that are growing and the income that is shrinking. They aren't looking for cost that are shrinking (i.e. underpayment of staff). A method of paying staff will be calculated, the process will be implemented, and moving forward everyone will just have to assume the process has been implemented correctly.
If the petrol bowser gave you a price 10% cheaper than what you expected the odds that you would notice would be far less than if it gave you a price 10% more expensive than you expected. Because you care about how much you are spending, not how little you are spending.
Therefore it is not a fact that we should see roughly equal numbers of overpayments as underpayments.
It's unfortunately that the media circus will continue to paint this as 'theft' and those looking for reason to bash corporate Australia has just had their cue.
You are right though, but I don't think mass media wants to see reasoning and the truth. Looking at the language and ridiculous analogues used to describe the situation might be good for a laugh but then you realise they weren't joking…
Funny how all these corporations are, systematically, underpaying their workers. Frankly you sound a touch naive to me if you think this is just a case of bad accounting for all these companies. The joke is people believe them when the keep trotting out the same excuses. The people who are being short changed aren’t laughing, most of them could’ve done with the money at the time they should’ve been paid it. I’m not laughing either, I’m a shareholder in Woolworths and their seems to be a rather large hole in their profitability. The difference I can afford to take the hit. The Age article said this issue had been raised with the company in February, we are now in November. I wonder how many people have been underpaid in the ensuing time period. I’m not one who believes in conspiracies but I do believe in waking up and smelling the coffee. Frankly if we didn’t have the mass media then these people would continue to be underpaid. Even our regulators don’t seem to be able to do their job.
So believing that it is possible that it's unintentional is naive but jumping to conclusions to think that it was intentional isn't tin foil hat stuff?
I'm having a hard time believing this was done intentionally, so how many thousands of people were affected? And none realised (or a few, whatever the number mentioned)? To me this says the employees also don't understand the awards.
On top of that I reckon this would actually be a nightmare to audit and discover who is owed what over what time frame. So the fact that it was raised in Feb and it's now November doesn't seem surprising, it's not like they just export some spreadsheet and turn on some filters, they likely have some highly paid auditing people in doing it for them.
@Nebargains: My friend noticed huge discrepancies in June and made a complaint to SDA, Wage Inspectorate & Fair Work, yet nothing was followed up after multiple contacts.
Seems similar to the view that copyright infringement (of movies for example) is theft.
It isn’t by the way… it is copyright infringement. (Imo the media is so conflicted it hasn’t done their job properly in that realm).
This type of employment contract where an employee is placed on a salary in return for unpaid overtime has been going on for years. As an employee of Woolworths in the 90s I was given a management salary position where working 10-11 hours a day was expected - weekends, public holidays all part of the so called salary. When you worked out your hourly rate you were being paid much less than the staff you were supervising. At the end of the day if you wanted to climb the corporate ladder you just sucked it up and got on with it. Fortunately I realised my self worth and found a better job.
Exactly. The whole point of getting a salary is you're not being paid per hour, you're just paid to get a job done. In theory that means you can get paid more for less time at work but in practice (especially at Woolworths and such where a manager's job is basically supervising shift workers) it rarely works out like that.
The current scandal is about how these Woolworths salaries have been designed to result in underpayment. From The Age article:
"Woolworths was misrepresenting the truth to their employee. They had told him that, as a salaried worker, he was not covered by an award or agreement. This is not true. The General Retail Industry Award covered him. Many managers are paid an annualised salary but this is not a blank cheque for an employer to suppress wages. The retail award sets a legal minimum rate that employers must pay at or above - even for salaried staff."
"The man worked from 7pm to 4am most days, including weekends. This entitled him to shift loadings. He was also entitled to allowances he was not receiving such as laundry allowance, cold area allowance, meal breaks and, crucially, overtime. As a shift worker, he was also entitled to an extra week’s annual leave. Findley calculated that if his client accepted Woolworths’ $70,000 offer, he would be doing himself out of $8065 per year. And in a few months time when the award pay rate stepped up but this employee’s salary remained the same, this would balloon to $10,797."
The whole reason they offer salaries though is so some managers can be paid more than others, either because they have to run a bigger store, manage more workers, or just better at negotiating. There are undoubtedly some salaried workers somewhere getting paid well above what their award rates are, but apparently they're very unlikely to be night-shift managers.
@ssquid: The scandal started when one worker's salary was investigated and found to result in large underpayments. Woolworths attempted to silence the complaint and stop other employees from becoming aware of the possibility of their own underpayments. Woolworths eventually owned up to the fact that these salaries caused widespread underpayments. The Woolworths CEO has admitted there has been underpayment, apologised, and yet people like you, for some unknown reason, choose to defend their actions and engage in speculation.
I like to think Ozbargain as a place where us, as consumers, get to tip the balance of scales of power slightly more in the favour of the little guy. We're being made aware of purchasing opportunities, product quality, retailer reputations, etc. Everything is geared towards empowering consumers. Yet, we still have people like you in this forum thread choosing to defend a large corporation that has shown itself to engage in, at the very least, unethical behaviour.
@kahn: I think you're reading too much into my posts based on your personal feelings. I haven't defended them at all.
Except the way they were paying the salary was against the law.
So tell me, do you have a degree in Industrial Relations Law to make such a claim?
They’ve admitted it.
@Vote for Pedro: Strange they would admit that you have a degree in Industrial Relations Law to make such a claim.
…Still much pain to come with a culture of paying employees from their sick entitlements, free working bee days when stores are closed, manipulating clockings to avoid overtime/penalty rates. BWS bosses are also just realising those 45k salaries are far from minimum wages/awards, too. Then come the fines of billions because payroll will show the intentional manipulation of the electronic time-sheets across the majority of stores.
That actually sounds identical to another liquor brand/s I know ;)
Worked for Coles for 17ish years, hit salary after 3 of those, never clocked on again, 11 hour days(minimum, had a couple of 20 hour days is my early years), every public holiday, 6 day/5 day alternating roster. The younger you are, the more you're expected to do to 'earn that management position'
I guarantee this is a wide spread issue. If your salary is in lieu of reasonable over time, do the math, are you better off overall.
Slightly harder maths: do you want career progression or not? It's a matter of give and take. You might technically be owed award rates, but you sure as hell aren't owed a promotion.
Hope the people complaining like being stuck at bottom management all their lives I guess.
So much for the awards (the law) and merit ey? It’s the arse kissers that should get the promotion in your world?
I progressed quite steadily through my career. Twice I resigned, twice I was asked to stay with a pay rise and/or moved closer to home. Quite often it wasn't the harder worker that got promoted, but the one that could talk out their ass.
Fact is all the way through, people that had 0 chance of being promoted further would still have that carrot dangled in front of them. It was very use and abuse.
Your position on the matter is making sense now.
Haven't voted. Won't vote. I understand that what has occurred with Woolies isn't one person, so it's almost physically impossible to impose jail terms for it.
Do you/have you worked in retail management on a salary earning below award wage?
JAIL THE CEO AND THE MANAGEMENT TEAM LET THEM DO HARD PORRIAGE
I'd more freely support a law making the use of all CAPS a criminal offence.
and poor spelling…
what the hell is porriage?
That's HARD PORRIAGE thank you;) Perhaps Tom Gleeson might know.
How about share holders?
Too broad a question. If you were knowingly trying to cover it up, yes. After reading the full story about woolworths, i was disgusted. They should cop a rap for that.
If they informed, and it's a genuine mistake, and they proactively do the right thing, then no.
Is it unfair to say that accountants (if particularly payroll given the subject) should perhaps be thought of even less than lawyers.
Very often heartless, soul-less and even brutal, certainly where 'expenses' such as wages are concerned.
Thoughts of how overall morale of employees will be affected are more often than not a non-issue… only after such matters of 'discrepancies' are made public do the pricks at the top start giving a shit.
I’m not voting as I don’t know what “theives” are 🤣
Gosh darn it. How did that happen.
If I read the article correctly, this wage theft was picked up the union and a class action against Woolworths was being prepared. So Woolworths decided to go into damage control and pay up for the last 9 years of underpayment. Interesting that the present federal LNP government want to remove unions’ rights to pursue this sort of filth by employers.
Interesting that the present federal LNP government want to remove unions’ rights to pursue this sort of filth by employers.
Any evidence?
Just like that restaurant/tv celebrity guy…. you must know you have suddenly an extra couple of million in your account to warrant the purchase of another property and car. Surely you would investigate where this sudden wealth is coming from, and how… as it would indicate a successful formula is applied that could be replicated elsewhere.
But I surmise he knew quite well where this sudden influx of wealth derived and elected to spunge off the ill begotten gains.
Now we are finding foreign backpackers are rorted, your average checkout chic rorted… it just does not stop.
And that is why these people should be prosecuted and sent to gaol.
If I found a wallet and failed to hand it in, it is classified as theft, with severe penalties.
I say gaol the lot of them.
If your bank account is slightly healthier because you failed to pay for your power bill, is that jail too?
I think we all get that the current law doesn’t define it that way. The question being posed is whether the law should change to treat employers stealing from workers the same way it treats employees stealing from employers.
But tshow and H&D want to ignore that and make a question of "whether the law should change to treat employers stealing from workers the same way it treats employees stealing from employers" into a question of "whether anyone failing to pay anything that they should should be thrown in to a debtors prison". A law would be capable of distinguishing between the two, so (unsurprisingly) this is a typical H&D strawman which is irrelevant to the question.
employers stealing from workers
The entire point is that this is a strawman itself. By the current law, this case isn't employers stealing from employees. As VfP well knows, stealing is defined by the law.
i worked for woolies as a casual back in the late 90s. im wondering where my super money is……
In the fortress coffers of solitude.
Wrong spot
Im not sure when people will start to clue up that EVERY SINGLE corporation dont give a single F$&c about you, the environment or the local soccer team. They just care about making the people at the top, the most amount of money as possible. This goes for not for profits and aid agencies as well. HR departments are not there to take care of employees well being, they are there to protect the company. Any donation to any cause is merely a publicity marketing stunt to improve the corporate image, make them look like the nice guy so that people will go there, to support the nice loving company.
What I don't get is why don't people check their entitlements ?
Trust employer .
Couldn't be bothered .
No skill set to understand the ledgers .
Probably other Woolworthes groups will end up with the same problem .
There's a power imbalance that makes people reluctant to; even if they find something, then challenging it is awkward.
I'm a professional with a lot of job security; I'm comfortable challenging my employers on any number of things without any fear of repercussions job wise.
My wife is has recently reentered the work force and is paid incorrectly in her current hospitality position (incompetence rather than malice I think; she's paid above the award for her weekday work, but under it for Sunday work - however her employer could balance the two out and pay her legally for the same amount overall, they're just idiots). She doesn't even want me to run the numbers on her payslips to ensure she's being paid what she should be because she doesn't want to challenge them on it if it is wrong (and I'm pretty confident that it would be…).
How about time spent on bludging?
I worked for Coles and Woolies during my younger days and it was not uncommon to see other staffs chatting around doing nothing every now and then… and going for ciggies break once every hour..
Whataboutism. Nothing to do with the topic.
But let’s assume your statement is factually correct and against workplace rules. On that basis it demonstrates a complete failure of management to ‘manage’ workers.
Seems like everything is an attempt to deflect accountability on to workers.
Well, "management" is the one being underpaid in this situation. Only salaried staffs were affected by the underpaying situation, so mostly store manager, team manager and so on. The people who you said are a failure.
So, you’re confusing two topics.
Completely separate topics. Managing work performance happens separately to paying the legal wage/salary irrespective of who is involved. I know it’s hard, but so try and keep up.
There should at least be a criminal record against someone even if no one goes to jail. There has the be a deterrent in place.
Same for people who don't pay their bills? Criminal records because we need a deterrent in place?
It is my personal opinion that any employer (organisation or individual) that deliberately conceals wrong-doing and defrauds a large number of entities (organisation or individuals) of materially significant entitlements should be held under the same laws as wrongful/insolvent trading (civil and criminal) penalties for directors.
It is stupid to compare a $300 default on a bill by an individual to a $300m rort by a large organisation specially coupled with the fact that there are deliberate attempts at concealment. There are enough deterrents in place for an individual by means of debt collectors and credit reporting where they can't get access to services. Organisations such as Woolies have such large bargaining power that they basically get away with just about anything.
You’re the kind of person that attacks people who support action on climate for using lightbulbs at home, aren’t you?
What happens when you hit someone's car with your car, don't stop/decide to run away, without realising the damaged party had a way to track you down (say through CC TV)?
i go to coles they have nice cheesecakes i like, ny baked. the best.
@HighAndDry: The tag-team duo is at it again! Truly the undisputed champions of the ozbargain forum. Always ready to take over the other's discussion when one gets tired or, as in this case, double-teaming an opponent. Bravo!
How about you two attempt to write something critical about Woolworth's actions rather than continuously punching down? You two are usually sniping at individuals who criticise systemic issues that perpetuate greed and injustice. How about punching up for a change?