The National Australia Bank has formally conceded it underpaid 66,000 workers a total of $127 million over 14 years, with the bank set to repay $169 million including superannuation and interest. The Fair Work Ombudsman said the issues stemmed from NAB's failure to properly track hours and apply entitlements, with some individual workers owed more than $87,000.
NAB first reported the pay issues to the regulator in 2019, but failed to fully resolve them for another seven years, with the problems continuing until this year. The bank will also make a $2 million contrition payment to the Fair Work Ombudsman to settle the legal aspects of the matter.
Numerous other major institutions, including universities, law firms and retailers, have confessed to large-scale underpayments.
Fair Work Ombudsman Anna Booth said the case highlighted serious issues when an employer fails to coordinate key business functions to meet workplace obligations, specifically naming payroll, industrial relations, technology, risk management, audit and legal.
NAB said it was working to find and repay all affected staff and would invest in improving its HR and payroll systems, with the work to be checked by an external auditor. NAB HR chief Sarah White said the bank took its payroll obligations extremely seriously and apologised for the unintended errors.
NAB made $6.1 billion in profit on $22 billion in revenue last financial year.
Analysis
Why This Matters
- Wage theft affects tens of thousands of workers, some of whom were underpaid by significant sums over many years.
- It raises questions about the effectiveness of self-regulation and corporate governance when a large, profitable bank like NAB takes years to fix payroll errors it identified in 2019.
- The case adds to broader concerns about workplace compliance across Australian industries, putting pressure on other companies to audit their own payrolls.
Background
The National Australia Bank is one of Australia's 'big four' banks. The underpayments, which occurred over 14 years, were first reported by NAB to the Fair Work Ombudsman in 2019. Despite this, the bank failed to fully fix the problems until this year, leading to the formal concession and repayment plan announced now.
Key Perspectives
Fair Work Ombudsman, Anna Booth: Said the underpayments highlight serious, long-running problems that can arise when an employer fails to coordinate key business functions to meet workplace obligations.
NAB: Acknowledged the unintended payroll errors, apologised to staff, and committed to investing in systems and external auditing to prevent recurrence. The bank is working to find and repay all affected employees.
What to Watch
- The outcome of the external audit NAB has commissioned into its HR and payroll systems.
- Whether the Fair Work Ombudsman pursues any further action beyond the contrition payment, or if other regulators take an interest.
- Broader impact on NAB's reputation and the potential for class-action lawsuits from affected workers.
Checked
12 claims in this story checked against 1 source: 12 supported.
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- SupportedNAB formally conceded it underpaid 66,000 workers $127 million over 14 years.Brisbane Times - Latest News: “The National Australia Bank has formally conceded it underpaid 66,000 of its workers $127 million over 14 years”
- SupportedNAB will repay $169 million to staff, including superannuation and interest.Brisbane Times - Latest News: “The bank will repay a total of $169 million to staff, including superannuation and interest.”
- SupportedNAB will make a $2 million contrition payment to the Fair Work Ombudsman.Brisbane Times - Latest News: “It will make a $2 million “contrition payment” to the Fair Work Ombudsman to effectively settle the legal side of the issue.”
- SupportedSome workers were owed more than $87,000 each.Brisbane Times - Latest News: “with some workers owed more than $87,000 each.”
- SupportedThe Fair Work Ombudsman said the issues stemmed from failures to track staff hours and correctly apply entitlements.Brisbane Times - Latest News: “In a statement, the ombudsman said the issues stemmed from NAB’s failures to check it was paying staff at least the legal industry minimum under its pay deal with workers, to track staff hours and to correctly apply entitlements such as penalty rates.”
- SupportedNAB first reported the pay issues in 2019, but did not fully fix them for another seven years, and the problems continued until this year.Brisbane Times - Latest News: “NAB first reported pay issues in 2019, but did not fully fix them for another seven years. ... the problems continued until this year.”
- SupportedThe $2 million contrition payment is to settle the legal aspects of the matter.Brisbane Times - Latest News: “It will make a $2 million “contrition payment” to the Fair Work Ombudsman to effectively settle the legal side of the issue.”
- SupportedNumerous other major institutions, including universities, law firms and retailers, have confessed to large-scale underpayments.Brisbane Times - Latest News: “Numerous other major institutions, including universities, law firms and retailers , have confessed to large-scale underpayments.”
- SupportedFair Work Ombudsman Anna Booth said the case highlighted serious issues when employers fail to coordinate key business functions, naming payroll, industrial relations, technology, risk management, audit and legal.Brisbane Times - Latest News: ““NAB’s underpayments highlight the serious, long-running problems that can arise when an employer fails to coordinate key business functions to meet their workplace obligations, including payroll, industrial relations, technology, risk management, audit and legal,” said the ombudsman, Anna Booth.”
- SupportedNAB said it was working to find and repay affected staff, would improve its HR and payroll systems, and would have that work checked by an external auditor.Brisbane Times - Latest News: “The bank said it was working to find and repay all affected staff. It would invest in improving HR and payroll systems to stop another issue happening, it said in a statement. That work will then be checked by an external auditor hired by the bank.”
- SupportedNAB HR chief Sarah White said the bank took its payroll obligations extremely seriously and apologised for unintended errors.Brisbane Times - Latest News: ““We take our payroll obligations extremely seriously as a basic element in employing people,” said NAB’s HR chief Sarah White. “We sincerely apologise for these unintended errors.”
- SupportedNAB made $6.1 billion in profit on $22 billion in revenue last financial year.Brisbane Times - Latest News: “NAB made $6.1 billion in profit on $22 billion in revenue last financial year.”