Housekeeping Company Fined in Record-Breaking Underpayment Case
Wednesday 11 September 2013 @ 9.26 a.m. | Industrial Law
A Perth based cleaning company has been fined a record $340,000 fine for underpaying six workers. Federal Circuit Court Judge Tony Lucev found the underpayment to have been deliberate and that the company had taken steps to limit the ability of the Fair Work Ombudsman to investigate.
Four women and two men aged between 20 and 30, all foreign nationals coming from Taiwan, Hong Kong, New Zealand and Ireland, were employed between June 2011 and January 2012 by Housekeeping Pty Ltd in the case of Fair Work Ombudsman v ACN 146 435 118 Pty Ltd & Anor (No.2) [2013] FCCA 1270.
Despite working for the company for only a limited time, the cleaners were underpaid varying amounts ranging from $1,915 and $4,554. Housekeeping Pty Ltd was fined a total of $286,550 and the business’s manager, Catherine Paino-Povey, was penalised a further $57,310.
Justice Lucev commented that the penalty was to be of an appropriate level to deter others in all industries from committing similar breaches of Australian workplace law. Lucev found that the business had also prevented the FWO from conducting a proper investigation, gave dishonest representations to the ombudsman, and showed no remorse.
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