Employment
Underpaid? See what your award says you were owed, week by week
A rate can look generous and still fall short of the award once evenings, weekends, public holidays, overtime and allowances are counted. Your pay slip will never show you the gap. This calculator checks every week against the award rate that applied that week, and shows what you could be owed.
Paid above the minimum? You can still be underpaid. The award sets the floor every week.
Being paid more than the National Minimum Wage of $1,004.90 a week does not mean you have been paid correctly. A modern award sets a rate for your pay level, a 25% casual loading, evening and weekend penalty rates, public holiday rates, overtime rates and allowances. Pay is checked by comparing what the award required in each pay period with what was actually paid in that period. A salary that covers the award easily in a quiet month can fall well short in a month full of weekend shifts.
Then the gap grows in three ways at once. Super at 12% is owed on the missing pay too. A court can add interest at 8.35% a year. And a court can reach back six years, so a small weekly gap becomes a big number by the time anybody looks.
Since 1 January 2025, deliberate underpayment is a crime. Civil penalties, which need no intent, reach $546,000 for a company that is not a small business and $5,460,000 for a serious contravention.
So an accidental shortfall is something an employer wants to find first, and an employee deserves to know about.
What the back pay calculator works out
- Your week, checked against the award. The rate for your pay level, the casual loading, penalty rates, public holidays, overtime and allowances, applied to your real pattern of hours, not an average.
- Every year at the rate that applied that year. Award rates rise every July, so a rate that was fine when it was agreed can fall further behind each year.
- Super on the shortfall at the rate that applied each year, and the super guarantee charge, which has no time limit.
- Interest at 8.35%, the rate a court can award, and the six years a court can reach back, with anything older shown separately.
- Five ways to get the money back, ranked. Asking the employer in writing, the Fair Work Ombudsman, the tax office for unpaid super, a small claim with its $100,000 cap, and an ordinary court proceeding. Each one ranked on what it can reach after the fee to use it.
What you get in the full report
- The exact figure, to the cent. Your week rebuilt hour by hour, and every financial year of the claim with what the award required, what was paid and the difference. Every line is shown, so anyone can check it.
- Both sides of a salary deal. What the same hours come to week by week, and added up over the year, so you can see what a written annualised wage arrangement changes.
- The employer's side, not just the employee's. The same calculation run as a self-audit, with the penalty ceilings the law allows on those figures. It works from either side.
- The records to ask for, and what each one proves. Plus the whole report as a PDF.
- Every job and every period, as many times as you like. One payment, $19, no expiry. An employment lawyer's fixed fee for a simple claim starts around $2,500, and a payroll audit runs $5,000 to $15,000.
What this calculator cannot do
It cannot decide which modern award covers you or which pay level you fall into. Those two questions decide everything else, and getting them wrong makes the rest of the maths wrong too. You can confirm both with the Fair Work Ombudsman on 13 13 94, and the report is built to be read alongside that answer. It is general information, not legal advice, and a disputed claim is decided by a court on the evidence.
Everything here runs on the 1 July 2026 award rates, after the 4.75% annual wage review increase.
What people ask before they run it
How far back can I claim underpaid wages in Australia?
Up to six years. Section 544 of the Fair Work Act stops a court ordering back pay for an underpayment that happened more than six years before the day a claim is filed, and that window moves forward every day. Unpaid super is the exception. The super guarantee charge has no time limit, so super can be chased through the tax office for periods the wage claim can no longer reach.
How do I know if I am being underpaid?
Compare what you were paid with what your award required for the same hours. Almost every underpayment is one of six things: the wrong award, the wrong pay level, missing penalty rates, unpaid overtime, missing allowances or short super. You can check all six from a pay slip and a roster in about twenty minutes, or get a free estimate from this calculator in about three.
Does my salary cover penalty rates and overtime?
Only sometimes. A salary covers penalty rates and overtime only under a written annualised wage arrangement that meets the award's rules, and only up to the outer limits written into it. Start and finish times must be recorded, the salary must be checked against the award every twelve months, and hours past the limits are paid on top. A salary can clear the yearly total and still fall short in single weeks.
I am paid above the award. Can I still be underpaid?
Yes, very often. The award minimum is only the floor for an ordinary weekday hour. A Saturday hour is 125% to 150% of it, a Sunday 150% to 200%, and a public holiday 225% to 250%. A flat rate that beats the weekday minimum by a dollar can still be well short on those days, which is why this calculator asks about your roster and not just your rate.
Which award am I covered by?
Your award depends on what the business does, not on your job title. A bookkeeper in a pub is usually on the hospitality award, and a cleaner hired by a cleaning company stays on the cleaning award wherever they are sent. A small number of awards, such as the clerks award, follow the job instead, and a registered enterprise agreement replaces the award for the staff it covers.
What is the casual loading in Australia?
The casual loading is 25% on top of the award rate for your pay level. It is paid instead of paid annual leave, paid personal leave, notice and redundancy pay, not as a bonus. On most awards it is already built into the casual penalty rates, so a casual Saturday in retail is 150% of the base rate, not 175%.
Do I get super on back pay?
Yes. Super is a percentage of ordinary time earnings, so pay that was too low made the super too low as well. The super guarantee is 12% now and was lower in earlier years. Super that is unpaid or late becomes the super guarantee charge, which is pursued through the tax office and has no time limit, unlike the six year limit on wage claims.
Can I get interest on unpaid wages?
Yes, if a court orders it. A court may add interest at the Reserve Bank cash rate plus 4 percentage points, which is 8.35% a year for the half year from 1 July 2026. It is simple interest, not compound, it runs from each pay period that was short, and only a court can award it.
What is the most I can claim in Fair Work small claims?
$100,000. The small claims procedure under section 548 of the Fair Work Act cannot award more than that, however large the claim is. The filing fee is $310 to $585 depending on the size of the claim, there are no hearing fees, the court is not bound by the rules of evidence, and lawyers can only take part with the court's permission.
How much is a typical award underpayment worth?
It depends on your hours and your award, which is why this calculator asks for both instead of quoting an average. The size mostly comes from how many hours should have had a penalty rate. Weekday-only work paid a little under the rate gives a small figure. Evening, weekend and public holiday hours paid at one flat rate give a large one. The free check uses the 1 July 2026 award rates.
Is underpaying staff a crime in Australia?
Yes, when it is done on purpose. Intentional underpayment is a crime for conduct on or after 1 January 2025, under section 327A of the Fair Work Act. A company faces a fine of three times the underpayment or $9,100,000, whichever is more, and a person up to 10 years in jail. An honest mistake is not the crime, but civil penalties need no intent and reach $546,000 for a company that is not a small business.
Is this calculator legal advice?
No. This is an information service. It applies the published award rates to the hours you enter and shows every step. It ranks the ways of getting money back on one stated measure, the most each can reach on your own figures, and does not recommend one. Whether a claim is worth making, and what a court would actually order, are outside that measure.
Do you take a cut of the back pay I recover?
No. There is one price, $19, paid once. We are not a claims firm, we do not act for anybody, we take no percentage of anything you recover, and we have no arrangement with any lawyer or claims service. What you get is the maths and the working behind it, so you can check every line yourself.
Can my employer find out I used this calculator?
Not from us. We never ask who your employer is, so there is nothing to find out. The calculator asks for an award, a pay level, a roster and a rate, and none of those identifies anybody. The name you can put on the report cover is optional and is used only to print it there. Separately, taking adverse action against someone for asking about their pay is unlawful under Part 3-1 of the Fair Work Act.
Everything on Award Back Pay
Your estimate is free, and it is a real answer.
Rebuilds what an Australian modern award required week by week - classification rate, casual loading, evening and weekend penalty rates, public holidays, overtime and allowances - compares it against what was actually paid, adds superannuation on the shortfall and interest, applies the six year recovery window, and prices every route the difference can be recovered through.
Start the Back Pay calculator
