Award exposure
Five rules in the pay engine produce a result Merrivale cannot defend. This is what each of them has cost, and how far back it goes.
Rules in error
5
Of 34 reviewed
Shifts affected
4,040
9.8% of last year
Last 12 months
$169,220
Wages only
Since March 2022
$612,000
Before super or interest
Where the money went
| Rule | What the engine does | Shifts | Average | 12 months | Direction |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Midnight crossing Since Mar 2022 |
Prices the whole shift at the rate for the day it started | 3,140 | $38.00 | $119,320 | Underpaid |
| Broken shift Since Mar 2022 |
Treats a split day as two engagements, so no allowance is paid | 412 | $45.00 | $18,540 | Underpaid |
| Public holiday substitution Since Nov 2023 |
Uses the state list, not the substituted regional day for the site | 204 | $70.00 | $14,280 | Underpaid |
| Minimum engagement Since Mar 2022 |
Pays hours actually worked when a shift is cut short on site | 188 | $50.00 | $9,400 | Underpaid |
| Sleepover, disturbed Since Feb 2024 |
Pays the allowance but not the hours worked during the night | 96 | $80.00 | $7,680 | Underpaid |
| Travel, metro sites Since Jul 2025 |
Pays the regional allowance on metropolitan bookings | 288 | $22.00 | $6,336 | Overpaid |
The overpayment does not offset the underpayments. It is
Merrivale’s cost either way, and the workers who were short-changed are not the
workers who were overpaid.
The cost of leaving it alone
Midnight-crossing rule2022–23 · $101k
2023–24 · $138k
2024–25 · $154k
2025–26 · $169k
Still running · $612k
Aged care carries most of it because aged care is where the night shifts are. The two residential providers are 67% of the exposure and 44% of the revenue.
Correcting it forward is the easy half.
The engine can be reconfigured this week. The 4,040 shifts already paid have to be
recalculated one at a time, and every one of them needs the roster, the timesheet and
the rate table as they stood on the night — not as they stand now.
Why it is on a screen at all.
Merrivale did not find this by auditing. The system prices every shift twice, once on
the configured rule and once on first principles, and lists the shifts where the two
answers differ. An exposure page is what that list looks like after four years of
nobody reading it.