Nearly 800 employees of South East Queensland's water supplier have been underpaid by more than $7 million, with the final total yet to be established.
The Fair Work OmbudsmanFair Work Ombudsman started investigating Seqwater in 2020 and found that the Queensland government statutory authority failed to correctly record and pay overtime, as well as other entitlements.
The water authority has signed an enforceable undertaking and the regulator is overseeing the back-payment of 790 current and former employees for work completed between 2016 and 2022.
The affected employees were engaged in a wide range of administrative, technical and professional roles.
There were more than $7.75 million paid out to Fair Work, with individual payments ranging from less than $1 and and $380,000.
Most of the underpayments were related to overtime pay, but other entitlements including travel, on-call and callback allowances, remote assistance allowance, leave loading and ordinary hourly rates were also underpaid.
The employees must be paid by February next year, and there are still more underpayments to be quantified.
Fair Work Ombudsman Sandra Parker said the authority had shown a commitment to correct the underpayments.
The water authority will have to pay $545,000 to the Commonwealth's Consolidated Revenue Fund.
Seqwater chief executive Neil Brennan apologised to underpaid employees in a statement, and said the authority had implemented a comprehensive suite of controls to ensure compliance with its obligations.
He said that the issue was largely a result of complex and ambiguous enterprise agreements and our payroll system.
We are nearing the end of the repayments to both current and former employees.
I want to apologise to our former and current employees who have been affected by this issue and I think it is of the utmost importance to pay our people correctly.