The former owner of a Turkish restaurant in Hobart has been fined a total of $78,000 for underpaying four workers.
The Federal Court Circuit found Oya Waechter underpaid the workers a total of $32,411 between February 2015 and June 2016.
One worker was underpaid $24,800 in one year with another only receiving 10 per cent of their wages.
Workers were often paid late, not paid at all or were not paid for the hours they worked. Employees also did not receive pay slips.
While Waechter was penalised $78,000, her husband Peter Waechter also received a fine of $22,000 for his role in some of the breaches, including matters relating to pay slips.
Judge Grant Riethmuller said the respondents’ actions were “deliberate”, and that they “must have simply ignored their obligations”.
The Court has ordered all employees to be back-paid.
Image credit: TripAdvisor
