Aged Care Award Interpretations in Astalty

Overview

Astalty uses the award on each worker's employment contract to interpret approved hours into pay categories and allowance quantities. This page describes the Aged Care Award rules currently implemented, including the limits you need to check before payroll.

The Award Pay Report, Award Playground, interpreted Excel exports and Xero timesheet push use this interpretation. The Award Interpretation tab on a timesheet batch is available on every payroll platform. On Employment Hero, PayCat and QuickBooks Payroll, the payroll platform calculates award pay itself from the timesheets Astalty sends, so what it pays can differ from these figures. See payroll platform differences.

Who this award covers

Confirm coverage and classification against clause 4 of the Award, including its exclusions and any applicable enterprise agreement. Selecting an award in Astalty does not determine a worker's legal coverage.

The Aged Care Award covers employees working in residential aged care - personal care workers, assistants in nursing, cleaners, laundry hands, food services staff and administration staff in a facility. Assistants in nursing moved into this award's direct care stream from 1 January 2025.

Check these related occupations separately:

Putting a worker on the Aged Care Award

The award is set on the worker's employment contract:

1. Open the worker's User Profile and go to the HR tab.
2. Create (or edit) their contract and set Award to Aged Care Award.
3. Choose their Aged Care Classification. Leave Base Hourly Rate blank to use the loaded award rate for the pay period, or enter an intentional override. Choosing a classification does not change an existing amount; see Maintaining Award Rates.

Classifications use the post-2024 three-stream structure rather than the old flat level ladder:

How your hours are interpreted

Shift loadings

A weekday shift attracts a loading based on when the shift starts. That start time determines the weekday loading. Weekend portions use the rate for the date worked. Public holiday flags take precedence; see the boundary check below.

Weekends and public holidays

Astalty splits shifts at midnight. A Friday 8pm-Saturday 6am shift uses the weekday night rate until midnight and the Saturday rate after midnight. A public holiday flag takes precedence over weekday and weekend categories.

For overnight work, review public holiday boundaries: an ordinary shift's holiday flag can apply to the whole shift.

Ordinary hours and overtime

Ordinary hours use the following caps. Hours beyond a cap become overtime:

• Full-time - 8 ordinary hours on a day shift or 10 on a night shift, per continuous shift, including across midnight. There is no separate daily cap.
• Part-time and casual - 10 ordinary hours per calendar day.
• Weekly / fortnightly - 38 hours per week, or 76 hours per fortnight.

For full-time workers, back-to-back shifts, travel that runs straight on and a recorded unpaid meal break of 30-60 minutes count as one shift. The joined shift takes the cap of the shift it starts with: 3pm-11pm followed by 11pm-7am is 8 hours ordinary and 8 hours overtime, and 11pm-7am followed by 7am-3pm is 10 hours ordinary and 6 hours overtime. Meal allowances follow the same shift. A gap without a recorded break starts a new shift. Part-time and casual doubles are not joined, because their cap is per calendar day.

Overtime is paid at 150% for the first 2 hours and 200% after that. Saturday overtime is a single flat double-time band. Sunday overtime is 200% and public holiday overtime is 250%.

Casual employees

The 25% casual loading behaves differently on ordinary hours and on overtime, and this is the detail most worth getting right:

• On ordinary rates the loading is added - a casual working a Saturday is paid 150% + 25% = 175%.
• On overtime the loading is folded into the base before the overtime multiplier is applied - a casual's first overtime band is 150% x 1.25 = 187.5%, not 175%.

Casual and part-time employees also have a 2-hour minimum engagement (full-time employees have a 4-hour minimum), flagged as a scheduling alert. Astalty pays a short engagement up to the minimum only when Pay Award Minimum Engagement is on. Otherwise pay covers the approved hours only. With the setting on:

• Part-time and casual: any break between two shifts starts a new engagement, so each portion of a broken shift has its own 2 hours. A worker rostered 9am-10am then 10:15am-3pm is paid 6.75 hours.
• Full-time: shifts on the same day 10 hours or less apart are one engagement, and the gaps between them are not paid. Two 1-hour visits at 9am and 2pm are paid 4 hours. After a gap, a shift that starts on a later day starts its own engagement, so 4pm-8pm then 5am-6am the next morning is paid 8 hours. Work that runs straight on across midnight still joins.

Sleepovers

A sleepover attracts an allowance per night for every employment basis, and a rostered sleepover is expected to span between 8 and 10 hours - outside that range Astalty raises a scheduling alert.

How active work during the sleepover is paid depends on the worker's employment basis:

• Full-time - all active work is paid as overtime, with no minimum payment.
• Part-time and casual - active work is paid at ordinary time plus any applicable shift or weekend penalties, with the usual daily and period caps converting excess hours to overtime.

The Award has further conditions for sleepover work. Astalty does not apply the non-emergency lesser-of payment comparison, the part-time comparison with full-time hours on that day, or the double-time consequence of an insufficient post-sleepover break. Check clause 22.9 and adjust payroll where required.

See How To Roster a Sleepover Support for the rostering workflow.

Broken shifts

A day with two or more work periods is treated as a broken shift. Broken shifts apply to part-time and casual employees only - a full-time worker with a split day is not treated as working a broken shift.

Work beyond a 12-hour span, measured from the start of the first portion to the end of the last, is paid at double time (200% permanent, 225% casual). On public holidays, span excess uses the public holiday overtime rate (250% permanent, 312.5% casual). There is no broken shift allowance.

Clause 22.8 requires mutual agreement and limits unpaid breaks to a total of four hours. Astalty does not enforce that four-hour limit or record the agreement; check both when rostering.

Sleepover and active-overnight records are excluded from the span, so sleepover-adjacent work never reads as a broken shift.

Allowances

• Overtime meal allowance - one meal once a shift's overtime exceeds one hour, and a second once it exceeds four hours. Turned on at Settings > Scheduling > Meal Allowance; it is off by default.
• Laundry allowance - per shift, capped weekly, for workers with the laundry entitlement on their contract.
• Uniform allowance - per shift, capped weekly, for workers with the uniform entitlement on their contract.
• Kilometre / vehicle allowance - per kilometre, for approved travel in a worker's own vehicle.

Astalty uses allowance rates loaded for the pay period. It does not retrieve changes live from Fair Work or update rates in Xero. Check both systems after a rate change; see Maintaining Award Rates.

Clause 15 allowances - leading hand, nauseous work and the cook/chef tool allowance - are not calculated. The leading hand allowance is all-purpose (added to the minimum rate before penalties), so it can be built into the worker's contracted Base Hourly Rate, for costing. You must also configure the corresponding all-purpose rate in payroll; changing the Astalty base rate does not update Xero.

Meal provision and notice conditions need a separate check; the automatic meal setting uses overtime thresholds. Uniform allowance during eligible leave is not generated from rostered shifts, so check it in payroll.

Scheduling alerts

Astalty raises alerts while you roster, before the hours reach payroll:

• Minimum engagement - 4 hours full-time, 2 hours part-time and casual
• Minimum 10-hour break between shifts, subject to the same-day checking limitation
• Broken shift span exceeded
• Sleepover span outside 8-10 hours
• Ordinary hours exceeded, for full-time and part-time employees. A full-time worker's shift is measured across the continuous shift, against the cap of the shift it starts with.
• Insufficient days off - two full days per week, or four per fortnight, for full-time and part-time employees

Where you see the interpretation

• Award Interpretation tab on a timesheet batch - the per-worker breakdown for the shifts in that batch.
• Award Pay Report - the same breakdown across a full pay period.
• Award Playground (under Scheduling > Award Playground) - experiment with hypothetical work records for a worker whose contract is on this award, including sleepover and active-overnight scenarios.
• Interpreted Excel exports and the Xero timesheet push use the pay categories and allowances described here. Other payroll exports can contain raw timesheet records; see payroll platform differences.

Each worker's expanded view includes the interpretation trace showing which Aged Care Award rules were applied - which cap was reached, which loading was classified, and why.

Setting up Xero pay items

Pay items are mapped per pay group, and one pay group's mapping can only encode one award's rates. Aged Care Award staff therefore need their own pay group.

Whilst we cannot provide payroll advice based on your interpretation and application of the Aged Care Award 2010, these are the Pay Items and their suggested multipliers when setting up Xero pay items for an Aged Care Award pay group. You should refer to the Award, or seek professional and qualified advice, to ensure accuracy and compliance for your organisation.

For the mapping workflow itself, see Setup Pay Items and Employee Templates in Xero and Setup Pay Groups and Employees in Astalty.

Frequently asked questions

Why is my part-time worker's afternoon shift paid at the ordinary rate?

Astalty applies the 6am-6pm span exception to part-time and casual contracts. The Award describes it for employees working less than 38 hours a week, so review a part-time or casual employee who actually works 38 hours. A full-time worker on the same roster line can receive the loading.

Why is my casual's overtime higher than the ordinary rate plus 25%?

Because on overtime the casual loading is folded into the base before the overtime multiplier, rather than added afterwards. The first overtime band works out at 150% x 1.25 = 187.5%.

Why didn't a broken shift apply for my full-time worker?

Broken shifts under this award apply to part-time and casual employees only. A full-time worker with two work periods in a day is not treated as working a broken shift.

Where do my aged care nurses go?

On the Nurses Award, with an Aged care - classification so they receive the higher aged-care nursing rates. This award has no nurse classifications.

Who updates pay rates after the Annual Wage Review?

You maintain your payroll rates and check the rate stored on each Astalty contract. Astalty uses loaded rate schedules, not a live Fair Work feed. See Maintaining Award Rates.

Can Astalty tell me if my roster complies with the Aged Care Award, or give payroll advice?

Astalty gives you the tools - the interpreter, the per-worker interpretation trace, the scheduling alerts and the playground - but it cannot give payroll advice or confirm compliance for your organisation. How the Award applies to your situation is your decision; refer to the Award or seek qualified advice.

What Astalty covers under this award

Sources and Review

Checked against Astalty and the current Aged Care Award award text on 29 September 2026. The supported-rules table describes product behaviour, not a complete compliance assessment. Recheck the Award and Maintaining Award Rates before a pay run involving changed rates or conditions.