"Fair Work Act 2009 s 327A criminal underpayment offence"
Fair Work Act 2009 (Cth) s 327A makes it a criminal offence for an employer intentionally to engage in conduct that results in failing to pay a required employee amount in full by the due date, with penalties including up to 10 years imprisonment for an individual and fines based on penalty units or three times the underpayment amount.
This is a human-established fact, not a universal axiom. It is true within CTH as enacted by Federal Register of Legislation.
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Verified against the current Federal Register of Legislation compilation of the Fair Work Act 2009 (Cth), C2026C00141, compilation date 2 April 2026: https://www.legislation.gov.au/C2009A00028/latest/text Current s 327A creates an offence where an employer is required to pay an amount to, on behalf of, or for the benefit of an employee under the Fair Work Act, a fair work instrument, or a transitional instrument; the amount is not excluded by s 327A(2); the employer engages in conduct; and the conduct results in failure to pay the required amount in full on or before the day it is due. For s 327A(1), absolute liability applies to the required-amount and exclusion elements in paragraphs (1)(a) and (1)(b), while intention is the fault element for the conduct and result elements in paragraphs (1)(c) and (1)(d). The maximum penalty is up to 10 years imprisonment for an individual, and a fine determined under s 327A(6): if the underpayment amount can be determined, the greater of 3 times the underpayment amount and 5,000 penalty units for an individual or 25,000 penalty units for a body corporate; otherwise 5,000 penalty units for an individual or 25,000 penalty units for a body corporate. Dogfood note: Source searches for Fair Work Act s 327A, wage theft, employee underpayment, and the criminal underpayment offence did not surface a native Fair Work Act s 327A row. Results were dominated by unrelated Competition and Consumer Act rows and existing proposed topics.
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