Summary of conditions
of employment
National Employment Standards and General Retail Industry Award 2010

			      Permanent, Full-time Employment

April 2012

Tasmania / New South Wales / South Australia / Queensland

This summary assumes the following things
•	The employment is full-time employment
•	The employment is not for shift-work
•	The employment is covered by the award named above and is not excluded from the scope of the award—see clauses 3 and 4 of the award
•	You work in either Tasmania, New South Wales, South Australia and Queensland

We have prepared this document to help you understand your conditions of employment. The document summarises important conditions of your employment that are covered by the General Retail Industry Award 2010 (the Award) and the National Employment Standards (the NES) in the Fair Work Act 2009. However, the transitional wage rates, loadings, penalties and allowances contained in the Award may apply to you which may mean that, until 1 July 2014, you are paid different rates to those contained in the Award.

You should not rely on this summary of the Award and the NES. It is not legal advice. To learn more about your conditions of employment under the Award, you can find the Award at http://www.fwa.gov.au/index.cfm?pagename=awardsfind#G.
To learn more about your conditions of employment under the NES, go to the Fair Work Online website at 
http://www.fairwork.gov.au/employment/national-employment-standards/pages/default.aspx.

Hours of work
You are to work an average of 38 hours per week. 
[See clause 11 of the Award.]

In addition to ordinary hours, we may require you to work reasonable additional hours. That is, in any given week, we may require you to work 38 hours plus reasonable additional hours. You may refuse to work unreasonable additional hours.
[See NES Fair Work Act sections 62(1) and (2).]
Overtime
For all work you do in addition to your rostered ordinary hours of duty, you will be paid at time-and-a-half for the first three hours, and double-time after that.
[See clause 28.2 of the Award.]

However, in certain circumstances, until 1 July 2014, you may only be entitled to a proportion of the overtime rates in the Award or you may be entitled to a higher amount than the overtime rates in the Award.
Frequency of pay

Tasmania / New South Wales / South Australia / Queensland

You will be paid weekly/fortnightly [Corporation to strike out one of these] by cash/cheque/electronic transfer of funds into the bank account or financial institution account that you nominate to us [Corporation to strike out two of these]. 
[See clause 23 of the Award.]
Your right to request flexible working arrangements
If you have been employed with us for 12 months or more, and you are a parent, or if you are responsible for caring for a child under school age or a child under 18 who has a disability, you have a right to ask us to change your working arrangements. 
[See NES Fair Work Act section 65.]
Parental leave
If you have been employed with us for 12 months or more, you are entitled to 12 months of unpaid leave parental leave to care for your own newborn child or your spouse’s or your de facto partner’s newborn child, or for a newly-adopted child who is under the age of 16 years.
[See NES Fair Work Act sections 67–70.]
Annual leave
You are entitled to four weeks paid annual leave for each year of service with us.  
Your annual leave accrues through the year, and your annual leave credits can be carried over from year to year.
[See NES FW Act sections 87(1) and 87(2).]
You may take annual leave for a period agreed between you and us.  

If you ask us if you can take a period of annual leave, and you have sufficient annual leave credits, we will not unreasonably refuse your request.
[See NES Fair Work Act sections 88 (1) and 88(2).]

You will be paid an annual leave loading of 17.5 per cent of your ordinary rate of pay, or the weekend penalty rates, whichever is the greater, but not both.
[See clause 31.3 of the Award.]

In certain circumstances, we may require you to take annual leave.
[See clause 31.5 of the Award.]
Personal/carer’s leave and compassionate leave
You are entitled to 10 days of paid personal/carer’s leave for each year of service with us.
Your paid personal/carer’s leave accrues through the year, and your paid personal carer’s leave credits can be carried over from year to year.
[See NES Fair Work Act sections 96–101.] 

You are also entitled to an amount of unpaid personal/carer’s leave.
You are entitled to two days of paid compassionate leave for each time that a member of your immediate family or your household gets a personal illness, or suffers an injury, that poses a serious threat to their life, or dies.

If you take personal/carer’s leave or compassionate leave, you must tell us that you are taking the leave as soon as you can, and you must give us reasonable evidence to show that you are taking the leave for the reason you are claiming it.
[See NES Fair Work Act sections 102–7.] 
Community service leave
You are entitled to take community service leave. This covers jury service, and reasonable time to do voluntary emergency management activities. If you take community service leave, you must tell us that you are taking the leave as soon as you can, and you must give us reasonable evidence that you are taking the leave for the reason you are claiming it.
[See NES FW Act sections 108–10.]
Public holidays
You are entitled to stay away from work on a day or part-day that is a public holiday in the place where your work is based, and to be paid for that day or that part-day.

But we may ask you to work on a public holiday. You may say no to our request, if our request is unreasonable, or if it is reasonable for you to say no.
[See NES Fair Work Act sections 114–16.]
Allowances
You may be entitled to some or all of the following allowances that are set out in the Award.
•	Meal allowance
•	Special clothing
•	Excess travelling costs
•	Travelling time reimbursement
•	Transfer of employee reimbursement
•	Transport allowance
•	Transport of employees allowance
•	Cold work disability allowance
•	First aid allowance
•	Recall allowance
•	Liquor licence
•	District allowance
[See clause 20 of the Award.]
However, in certain circumstances, until 1 July 2014, you may only be entitled to a proportion of the allowance or you may be entitled to a higher amount than the allowance contained in the Award. Up until 1 July 2014, you may also be entitled to a proportion of allowances not set out in the Award.
Accident Pay
You may be entitled to Accident Pay.
[See clause 21 of the Award.]
Higher duties
You will be paid at the higher rate for the whole day if you work for more than two hours during one day on duties at a higher classification than your own classification.  If you work on higher duties for two hours or less on one day, you will be paid at the higher rate only for the amount of time worked on the higher duties.
[See clause 20.12 of the Award.]
Superannuation
The Award sets out conditions that apply to you and to us in relation to superannuation. Among other things, it sets out the superannuation funds to which we will make contributions, and requires us to make contributions while you are on paid leave, and while you are on workers compensation while you are employed by us (for up to 52 weeks).
[See clause 22 of the Award.]
Notice of termination of employment
If we decide to terminate your employment, we will give you the amount of notice that is set out in the table below.
Period of your employment with us				Notice
Up to one year							one week
More than one year but not more than three years			two weeks
More than three years but not more than five years 			three weeks
More than five years							four weeks

And if you are over 45 years old and you have been employed with us for at least two years, we will give you an additional week of notice.

If you decide to resign at any time, including while you are on probation, you will give us the amount of notice, up to a maximum of four weeks, set out in the table above.

We may elect to pay you an amount in lieu of notice. This amount will be equal to the amount we would have paid you if you had worked with us until the end of your notice period.
[See NES Fair Work Act section 117 and clause 14 of the Award.]
Redundancy pay
If you have been employed with us for at least one year, you will be entitled to be paid redundancy pay if we terminate your employment because we no longer need your job to be done by anyone (except where this is due to the ordinary and customary turnover of labour) or where we become insolvent.

The amount of your redundancy pay will depend on how long you have been employed by us.  

The minimum amount of your redundancy pay will be calculated using the table in section 119 of the Fair Work Act. You may be entitled to more than this, under a transitional State Award, until the end of the transitional period at the end of 2014.
[See NES Fair Work Act sections 119–21 and clause 15 of the Award.]
[Note: This entitlement will not apply if the employer is a small business employer within the meaning of the Fair Work  Act: see sections 121(1)(b) and 23 of the Fair Work Act.]
Fair Work Information Statement
We will provide you with a copy of the Fair Work Information Statement, prepared by the Fair Work Ombudsman, when you start employment with us.
[See NES Fair Work  Act section 125.]