Employment Hero AI unlocks new employment model targeting $12.6 billion in duplicated employment admin holding Australia back

• New modelling shows businesses are paying $12.6 billion more than they should in employment administration 
• Complex, manual HR processes are driving duplication, costing up to a quarter of an employee’s salary and dragging down productivity
• Despite Australian businesses spending $160 billion annually on compliance, hundreds of thousands of workers remain underpaid and over half of audited businesses still fail to comply
• New data shows casual hiring is surging at more than double the rate of full-time roles, as businesses seek flexibility amidst rising compliance pressure and wavering business confidence

Sydney, Australia – 22 April 2026 – Australian-founded AI-powered employment platform, Employment Hero, has today launched HeroForce, a new fully-managed employment model designed to centralise and automate the world’s most complex regulatory landscapes. 

Australian businesses face one of the most cumbersome compliance landscapes in the world – paying $160 billion annually to keep up with regulatory requirements. The kicker: each and every business does this individually, and largely manually, costing up to a quarter of an employee’s salary and dragging down productivity.

Employment Hero modelling shows businesses are paying an additional $12.6 billion in duplicate employment admin¹. But despite this significant expenditure, hundreds of thousands of workers remain underpaid, and over half of audited businesses are still failing to comply with regulatory standards.

But now, Employment Hero has combined their end-to-end employment infrastructure with their suite of AI employment agents (Hero AI) to centralise and manage employment complexity at global scale for the first time. 

HeroForce is an AI-enabled evolution of co-employment models that offers a new choice for Australian businesses where Employment Hero becomes the legal employer, managing payroll, compliance and HR administration, while businesses retain full operational control of their workforce. 

While successful internationally, a local model has been previously unworkable at scale in Australia due to the structural complexity of the national system – too costly and cumbersome to manage. Hero AI now breaks these

barriers, powering EH’s Employment Operating System that automates everyday compliance and admin and makes the traditional PEO model even more cost-effective. 

Employment Hero CEO and Co-Founder, Ben Thompson, says HeroForce will not only reduce duplicated administrative costs but will help overcome the significant structural barriers holding Australian employers and employees back. 

“Most businesses aren’t failing at compliance because they’re careless or dishonest. They’re struggling because individual employers are trying to solve an extremely specialised regulatory problem while also running the business. The system has become too complex to manage manually.”

Australia’s employment framework includes more than 120 modern awards, each with its own classifications, pay conditions and compliance requirements. The regulatory burden is continuing to grow, with wage theft now a criminal offence, minimum wages and superannuation contributions increasing and reforms such as Payday Super and onboarding reforms from 1 July adding further administrative obligations.

At the same time, businesses are facing a perfect storm of economic conditions: Australia is grappling with a national productivity crisis, while 59 per cent of organisations report that reducing operational costs is their primary challenge. This is compounded when 49 per cent of businesses are struggling to attract and retain talent in a shifting labour market where new Employment Hero Jobs data shows casual employment is surging at 9.3 per cent year on year, more than double the rate of full-time roles⁵ and the ABS reports 7.5% of the workforce are independent contractors, as businesses seek flexibility amidst rising compliance pressure and wavering business confidence. 

Thompson said artificial intelligence is now making it possible to relieve this growing pressure for employers. 

“The average SMB spends $40,000–$80,000 a year just to stay compliant with employment law. Running a business in Australia increasingly means becoming an expert in payroll, modern awards, Fair Work compliance and superannuation,” Mr Thompson said.

Employment Hero’s Hero AI can interpret modern awards, develop rosters, automate payroll calculations and monitor compliance obligations across thousands of employment relationships simultaneously.

“That fundamentally changes the economics of employment administration,” Thompson said. 

“By removing the friction that prevents employment, employment becomes cheaper and simpler and as decades of historical evidence tell us, businesses will employ more people to build more, serve more, expand into new areas. Every hour reclaimed from repetitive administration is an hour redirected to work that actually grows economies.” 

Analysis of Professional Employer Organisations in the US shows user organisations have twice the growth rate of comparable companies, 12 per cent lower employee turnover and are 50 per cent less likely to go out of business⁷. Organisations report an average 27.2 per cent return on investment, with a 3–5 per cent service fee unlocking fully-managed employment⁷.

Thompson said the model ultimately benefits workers as well as businesses.

“The last financial year saw 250,000 Australian workers underpaid, despite the huge investment in compliance³. Of the businesses the Fair Work Ombudsman investigated, 56 per cent were found to be non-compliant⁴. For years, I’ve seen businesses try and navigate the system to fall short due to its complexity rather than deliberate wrongdoing. These issues are frequently the result of fragmented compliance systems rather than bad intent,” Thompson said.

Employment Hero modelling shows an estimated underpayment exposure $18,668 per year or a typical 50-person business – a risk that HeroForce will address for Australian employers^1.

HeroForce has been designed to operate fully within Australia’s regulatory framework. Workers engaged through the platform are employees under formal employment contracts and retain full protections under the Fair Work Act, including award wages, superannuation contributions, leave and workers’ compensation.

HeroForce is now available for Australian businesses. Employment Hero is making HeroForce available in Australia, New Zealand, the UK and Canada, bringing the same AI-powered efficiency to these high-complexity markets on its mission to make employment easier and more valuable for everyone on earth. 

For more information, visit employmenthero.com/products/heroforce.