The Fair Work Ombudsman has recovered $182,596 in unpaid wages for 214 workers from the outlets of the Sandwich Chefs deli carvery franchise across four states.
Fair Work inspectors investigated 39 businesses from the franchise located in Victoria, NSW, South Australia and Queensland during the years 2020 and 2021.
$98,912 was recovered for 118 Victorian workers from 12 businesses, $34,189 for 32 workers in NSW from six businesses, $28,989 for 28 QLD workers form five and $20,506 for south Australian workers from 3 businesses.
The investigation was carried out after significant underpayments and record-keeping breaches were found at two Geelong Sandwich Chefs outlets during separate proactive audits conducted earlier.
Inspectors conducted interviews with employees, managers and employers while also checking payslips and records.
Findings showed that 32 of the 39 outlets (82 per cent) were non-compliant with workplace laws.
28 underpaid employees and 16 had breached record-keeping and payslip obligations with the most common breaches being the underpayment of the minimum hourly pay rate from 16 businesses.
Failure to pay weekend penalty rates were found in 10 businesses and failure to make and keep employee records within another 10 businesses.
Recoveries form individual businesses ranged from $165 for four employees at an Adelaide store to $27,807 for 18 employees of a Melbourne business.
32 Compliance Notices were issued to 26 businesses while 18 Infringement Notices were issued for record-keeping and pay slips breaches, resulting in $15,330 in fines paid, along with three contravention letters and two formal cautions.
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