D-Day for offering casual conversion
D-Day for offering casual conversion
The countdown is nearly over for employers to comply with the new casual conversion provisions under the Fair Work Act 2009 (Cth).
From 27 September, employers will have an ongoing obligation to assess casual employees for conversion to permanent employment. It is essential that you provide all casual employees with the linked Casual Employment Information Statement by this date.
Small Business Employers have an obligation to consider requests from employees to convert from casual to permanent employment.
Non-Small Business Employers (employers with 15 or more employees) do have an obligation to consider offering employees from casual to permanent employment on the later date of the following, 27 September 2021 and the casual employee’s 12-month anniversary date.
If you wish to explore circumstances where you may not, as a non-Small Business Employer, be required under the Act to offer casual conversion, you can purchase a recording of our webinar - Changes to Casual Employment Laws. The recorded webinar is $50 for AMA Queensland members and $100 for non-members.
Here are the steps to comply with offering casual conversion under the Fair Work Act 2009 (Cth):
Step one: You offer the employee conversion to permanent employment.
Step two: The employee within 21 days must respond in writing stating whether they accept or reject conversion to permanent status. No response in writing means it is rejected.
Step three: If the employee accepts conversion to permanent employment, you need to have a prescribed discussion with the employee. In this discussion you need to discuss:
- conversion to full-time or part-time employment;
- the hours of work, if conversion takes effect; and
- the day the conversion to permanent employment takes effect.
Step four: The Notice of Casual Conversion is issued to the employee confirming all of the above, i.e:
- whether the employee is converting to full-time or part-time employment;
- the hours of work, if conversion takes effect; and
- the day the conversion to permanent employment takes effect.
Due to the introduction of this ongoing obligation, the Workplace Relations Team at AMA Queensland have generated some templates to support you in approaching casual employees with offers of conversion to permanent employment.
These templates include:
- an Offer of casual conversion template;
- a Request to participate in discussion template; and
- a Notice of casual conversion template.
If you are interested in these templates, please contact the Workplace Relations Team for more information. The templates are complimentary to WRAP members, but available for purchase to all other members of AMA Queensland.