Businesses fined for stealing workers’ super

The ATO has hit more than 1500 businesses with a harsh penalty after they were caught stealing money rightly owed to their workers.

More than 1500 fines were sent to businesses last year for stealing superannuation from Australian workers.

The Australian Taxation Office fronted a parliamentary inquiry investigating wage theft on Friday.

Employers that do not meet their superannuation obligations can face penalties of up to 200 per cent of the unpaid contribution.

ATO spokesman John Ford told the committee it handed down the maximum fine nine times after audits during 2019.

A charge of between 150-199 per cent was used 92 times, and fines between 149-200 per cent of the amount were issued 206 times.

A lower charge of between 99-150 per cent of the contribution was used 1222 times.

More than 2233 director penalties notices involving 1572 companies were also issued by the tax office after bosses failed to pay the money in full by the due date.

At least $146 million in superannuation was not paid by the directors, with only $20.6 million recovered so far.

Workers made 35,400 reports of noncompliance in 2019-21.

However, in one in four complaints, the employer was found to be compliant.

Despite the COVID-19 pandemic, Mr Ford said a similar amount of superannuation had been paid compared with the previous year.

“That growth has not been at the same level as previous years but it has not gone backwards,” he said.

The last analysis of unpaid and stolen super undertaken in 2016-17 showed workers were robbed of $2.3 billion worth of payments.

Mr Ford said a pilot conducted last year, which matched small business payroll data with payments from superannuation funds, identified 2600 employers underpaid workers or were late.

“As a result of that nudge and asking employers to check their records we had an additional $28.1 million paid in super,” he said.

“We are looking to continue to roll those pilots forward, but we had a pandemic in between.”

Treasury officials are in talks with the Attorney-General’s Department about including wage theft and superannuation guarantee in the employment standards but revealed progress had also been delayed during the coronavirus pandemic.