At a glance: What legal entitlements do not-for-profit organisations owe to employees?
Not-for-profit community organisations are bound by the same employment laws as any other employer. Working out the entitlements you owe your employees and meeting those obligations can seem overwhelming. These pages are designed to break down what you owe your employees and help you to navigate your obligations so you can identify if and where you need some more detailed advice.
Meeting the legal entitlements of your employees is vital - your organisation is breaking the law if it doesn't meet these obligations, and your organisation's success and development often hinges on your employees. Unless you meet their entitlements and treat them fairly and well, things can go very wrong!
The legal obligations you owe to your employees can seem hard to follow, so this page is designed to provide you with information, and links to more detailed information, about the key legal obligations you owe to your employees.
Where do we start?
Fair Work Australia has an 'employment checklist' which provides an overview of your obligations and identifies where there are gaps. As the checklist states, you might then want to contact Fair Work Australia for more information on specific areas.
What is a Fair Work Information Statement?
You must give each new employee a Fair Work Information Statement before, or as soon as possible after, they start employment. If you think that you have employees who do not have a copy of a fair work statement, you need to provide one urgently.
You can give the statement to your employee(s) personally or you can send it in various ways.
The statement contains information about the National Employment Standards (NES) and the rights and obligations of employees.
To find out more and download a copy of the Fair Work Information Statement, go to Fair Work Australia.
What are the National Employment Standards (NES)?
All employees are entitled to 10 minimum standards of employment. These are set out in the Fair Work Act 2009 (Cth) and called the NES.
The NES provides a safety net for all Australian employees and relates to:
- maximum weekly hours
- requests for flexible working arrangements
- parental leave and related entitlements
- annual leave
- personal/carer's leave and compassionate leave
- community service leave
- long service leave
- public holidays
- notice of termination, and
- redundancy pay.
For more information on the NES go to Fair Work Australia and Business Victoria.
For information on long service leave, including a long service leave calculator, go to Business Victoria.
What conditions are our employees entitled to apart from the NES?
This varies, but employees often have legally binding conditions of employment apart from the NES. These conditions might come from the relevant award or enterprise agreement, or a determination of Fair Work Australia which outlines the terms and conditions of employment that supplement the NES for that particular kind of employee.
For example, there might be extra conditions relating to penalty and overtime rates, loadings and allowances.
If you are not sure whether an award, agreement or determination applies to your new employee, and for more information go to Fair Work Australia.
There is also information on awards at Business Victoria.
You might also like to contact a peak body for employers, like Jobs Australia or VECCI, to check that you are meeting your obligations, or visit the Business Victoria website for information and materials go to Business Victoria.
Employee legal entitlements FAQs
PilchConnect has produced answers to FAQs about superannuation, OH&S, insurance, tax, equal opportunity and record keeping, go to:
Managing employees
We recommend that you consider implementing a Human Resources Manual. There is a template available at Business Victoria.
Induction and training
You might also be interested on information on induction and training of employees. If so, go to the Business Victoria website – their YouTube clips are a good starting point:
Peformance review
Business Victoria has a performance and development agreement template. They also have a blog which provides some useful information about performance review: