Late pay due to holidays

[Ixion]

Your employer is legally bound to pay you prior to a Stat Holiday if your normal pay day falls on a Stat.

They broke the law. Kick their arse.

Correct. But in this case the OP gets paid on a Wednesday , which was not a stat day. So what happened was, normally the boss or pay clerk works out the pay and processes the bank lodgements etc on the Tuesday (or maybe starts on Monday). This month the said pay calculator was on holiday on Monday and Tuesday, so didn't do any of it. So nobody got paid. Which is not the workers fault, or concern. The employer is in breach of law. However, in practice, there is little that can be done about it.

[Oakie]

Your employer is legally bound to pay you prior to a Stat Holiday if your normal pay day falls on a Stat.

Yay. One for me. There is actually NO LEGISLATION regarding this so employers aren't obliged to pay you before a public holiday. Trust me on this. (It's my job to know this stuff).
About 25 years ago there was a document called the 'Public Service Regulations' which governed how public servants were to be paid. My memory is a bit flaky on this now but t said that public servants should be paid 2 clear days (I think) prior to a public holiday if that holiday fell on pay day. This was however just a 'company policy' as such and did not a apply to the workforce as a whole. Of course so many people were 'public servants' back then that a large proportion of the workforce were paid in this way and I guess it was just assumed to be the law. More importantly at that time though, many people were paid in cash which caused problems for employers as well as employees if pay day was also a public holiday so many chose to pay their employees early. It however was never a legislative requirement.Of course there is nothing to stop an employer deciding to pay early if they want to.

What is a legislative requirement however is for people to get their HOLIDAY PAY in advance of taking annual leave and this may be getting confused with this public holiday thing. (As an aside, I've found that the huge majority of people elect to have their holiday pay paid on their normal paydays during an absence rather than having it paid in advance)

The other thing in play nowdays though is that 'everyone' gets their pay direct credited and 'everyone' uses a cash card. This means 'no-one' needs to go to a bank to get cash out. You can therefore set up a payroll to credit on the night before the public holiday (as long as the night before is a work day) and the funds will still be available for people to use on their EFTPOS cards on the normal payday, even though it's a public holiday.

Having said all that though, because there's nothing in legislation about it, you can default back to the EMPLOYMENT AGREEMENT for guidance. There'll be a clause about when wages are to be paid. If it says something like "wages will be paid on the Monday following the end of the pay period" then if the wages weren't paid until Wednesday because Monday was a holiday then there is room for the employee to say "Hold on a minute...". If the clause says something like "wages will be paid within 3 working days of the end of the pay period" then you're guided by when the three WORKING days finishes.

Sorry if this is a bit long winded but I've been away from work for a week now (my first Xmas/New Year break for 12 years ... payroll is like that) and it's been strange not doing workee stuff at this time of year. This has helped get it out of my system. Yeah, I'm a sicko!

[Ixion]

Yay. One for me. There is actually NO LEGISLATION regarding this so employers aren't obliged to pay you before a public holiday. Trust me on this. (It's my job to know this stuff).
,,

Technically, correct. However, wages may not be held over but must be paid over in full on pay day. So, in the absence of an agreement to the contrary, if payday happens to fall on a stat day, the wages must still be paid. Nowadays, with direct crediting etc , that should not be a problem (though the OP's experience shows it still can be). But, a worker may still require that his wages be paid in cash (except for government and local body employees - go figure) . So if a worker is paid in cash , and payday is a stat day, then the employer has a problem. He obviously does not wish to have to open up to pay out wages. But he may not legally hold over the money. So, his only effective option is to pay out early. In other words, the employer is not bound to pay in advance. But neither may he use "It's a stat day" as an excuse for not paying wages on the due day (payday) .He may not hold the money over, he cannot pay out on the stat day, he must therefore pay in advance.

The terms of employment contracts may vary this nowdays.

[kevie]

My pay always goes in on a Monday night, and most public hols are the same day so many times I get a late pay, Im aware of it so its not a problem for me, and I several times warned our newish staff about it the couple weeks prior to the Christmas week where pay went in a couple days late, so trusting they were prepared for it too.

The boss has a automatic payment set up and it ticks over to the next bank day, alto I have told him in the 'setup' of the payment details he can select to pay the working day earlier instead.
Took enough time to get him to do it as auto rather than manual payments so dont want to press him too hard too fast LOL but will eventually change

[Toaster]

Hey guys.
My pay was late .

Mate, that stinks! I was fortunatel to get paid in advance, shame not all employers think to do that for staff at an expensive time of year! Hope you have a great New Year.

[James Deuce]

Interesting concept Oakie. Datacom's payroll processing is geared around avoiding what Mafu's run into and from the way it was explained to us, there is a legal obligation to make sure that people are paid prior to Statutory Holidays.

I'm going off what I've been told of course, which may be bollocks. I shall have to check that for myself.

[Ixion]

Interesting concept Oakie. Datacom's payroll processing is geared around avoiding what Mafu's run into and from the way it was explained to us, there is a legal obligation to make sure that people are paid prior to Statutory Holidays.

I'm going off what I've been told of course, which may be bollocks. I shall have to check that for myself.

Prior to or on. On the day is legally OK, but seldom practical. Which only leaves prior to.

[Oakie]

All governed by the Employment Agreement and how it's worded. Some wordings will make it a contracted (but not legislated) obligation on the part of the employer to pay prior to the day, other different Agreements will not ... so you can't make a black and white ruling about this.
In my own case, my previous employer's agreement said "your salary will be direct credited into your nominated bank account on the Thursday following the end of the pay period". My new employer's agreement however says "Your salary will be paid within 10 days of the end of the pay period, normally on the Friday following..." so the first is arguable but the second they would be quite legally within their rights to pay a little later.
Bottom line I suppose is that regardless of when the days fall, an employer could do the pay as normal and send it to the bank as normal. If it just so happens that the bank is unable to process the payment because it's a Pub Hol the employer could argue that they have still met their obligations and it's not their fault the bank could not process it on time.
It's an interesting one and to the best of my knowledge not one that's been tested in court yet.

[KATWYN]

I think its time to get outa business and go and work for someone.