Navigating the 2026 & 2027 SCHADS Award Changes

The 15% increase from 1 December 2026 (previously planned for 1 October 2026) applies only to Home Care – Disability Care employees. 

It does not apply to Home Care – Aged Care employees. 

It also does not extend to office, administrative or other SCHADS employees, such as those under the Social and Community Services, Crisis Accommodation or Family Day Care streams of the Award.

From 1 December 2026 each classification receives a 15% increase and from 1 October 2027 there is a further top-up (ranging from 0% to about 7%) to bring rates to the new “translated” level under the single classification structure.

The 1 December 2026 rates have been published here.

Yes. These rates will be set out in the SCHADS Award in due course.

The increase only applies to Home Care – Disability Care employees. Such employees are those providing support to individuals in their own private homes. 

Disability care in a residential / community setting which would come under the Social & Community Services stream (not the Home Care – Disability Care stream) of the Award.

Social & Community Services employees are not eligible for the pay increase.

Not automatically. The Award sets what you must pay your employees. It does not set what funders (NDIS or state programs) pay you. Any change to NDIS or state fee schedules is decided and announced separately by those bodies. As at the webinar date, there was no confirmed matching increase. An Award increase does not guarantee a matching funding increase, so check the NDIS and relevant state pricing announcements.

These have now been published and you can view them here.

Yes, this is possible.

The sleepover period is a continuous 8-hour block and is not fixed to start at 10pm. In the webinar example it ran from 11pm to 7am. What changed from 1 June 2026 is that the periods worked before and after the sleepover are now treated separately for shift penalties. You can also agree to up to 12 ordinary hours across the whole shift, with a maximum of 8 hours on either side.

It is $62.87 per sleepover. The $60.02 figure we referred to predates the 1 July 2026 wage increase.

No. Since 1 June 2026 the sleepover period is not treated as a break between shifts. Work before and after the sleepover is part of the same continuous shift, although shift penalties are now worked out separately for each part.

For the sleepover period itself they receive the sleepover allowance ($62.87), not hourly pay, because they are sleeping. If they are woken to work, that work is paid at overtime rates with a one-hour minimum. The active hours rostered before and after the sleepover are paid as ordinary hours (or overtime) as applicable.

The Award does not cap interruptions at 2 hours. Any work performed during the sleepover is paid at overtime with a minimum of one hour overall. If interruptions become so frequent or lengthy that the person is not genuinely getting a sleepover, it may cease to be a sleepover and become payable as ordinary or overtime working time.

The Award does not specifically say that work performed has to be unplanned, and there is no express prohibition on planned activities. However, the Award is not completely clear on this, so we recommend you seek advice on your individual circumstances.

Yes. You can roster a standalone sleepover (the 8-hour period plus the allowance) with no active work before or after. The rule about rostering at least 4 hours only applies if you do roster work on either side. It does not force you to add active hours.

Yes. The ability to agree to up to 12 ordinary hours across a sleepover shift applies to employees generally (full-time and part-time) by agreement. It is not limited to casuals.

The Award requires a break of 10 hours between shifts (8 by agreement where a sleepover is involved). If the required break is not given, the employee is paid at double time until they receive the required unbroken break. This applies to both casual and permanent staff.

It is highly advisable to document the agreement to reduce the between-shift break from 10 to 8 hours. Keep a written record that is signed or acknowledged by the employee.

Board (meals) and suitable accommodation are a required part of the sleepover entitlement, so a failure to provide meals is a non-compliance rather than a wage underpayment with a set “penalty”. Best practice would be to provide the employee with some form of reasonable compensation.

Each period of work during the night is paid at overtime (minimum one hour overall). If the employee did not receive adequate sleep, this may become a work health and safety issue. You should not require someone who has not had adequate rest to keep working if it is unsafe. Consider fatigue management and rescheduling the morning shift. We recommend you seek advice on your individual circumstances.

The Award is not completely clear on this, but we think the likely effect is that the 9th hour before the sleepover would be overtime and the rest of the hours would be ordinary hours. 

It would be safest not to deliberately roster this way. We recommend you seek advice on your individual circumstances.

Clause 10.5 of the Award says “part-time and casual employees will be paid for the following minimum number of hours, at the appropriate rate, for each shift or period of work in a broken shift:

(a) social and community services employees (except when undertaking disability services work)—3 hours;

(b) all other employees—2 hours.”

We think it likely that the minimum period would apply to the whole sleepover shift, rather than the periods before and after it. So it is likely to be ok to roster someone to work 1 hour after the sleepover (so long as they were rostered to work at least 4 hours before).

We encourage you to seek advice on your own individual circumstances, as a number of different factors are at play. Care would need to be taken that the rules about having a break between shifts (normally 10 hours, but 8 by agreement where a sleepover is involved) are not breached.

Work during the sleepover period (before it ends) is paid at overtime regardless of the clock time – the old “night shift” loading no longer applies to sleepovers. If the sleepover runs to 7am, the 05:30am–07:00am portion is overtime (minimum one hour), and the active period after the sleepover is assessed separately, with the post-sleepover period not attracting night-shift penalties under the new position.

We agree. An afternoon shift is one that finishes after 8:00pm and at or before midnight. A shift finishing exactly at 8:00pm is not “after 8pm”, so it does not attract the afternoon shift loading.

Normal meal break rules apply to the active work periods. If an active period is long enough to trigger a meal break under the Award (generally an unpaid meal break for shifts over 5 hours), a meal break should be given within that active period. The sleepover itself is not a meal break.

Under the Award, meal breaks are generally unpaid and run for 30 to 60 minutes, while short rest or tea breaks (usually about 10 minutes) are paid. The exact entitlement depends on the length of the shift. The sleepover allowance covers the sleep period and is not a paid break.

If nights are genuinely unpredictable, a sleepover (allowance plus overtime for any interruptions) can still be used, with overtime paid for any active work. If the person is regularly active for much of the night, you could consider rostering an active (awake) shift or using 24-hour care arrangements.

On a weekday excursion, ordinary hours can be worked between 8am and 6pm up to a maximum of 10 hours in the day (by agreement), so you are allowed to pay up to 10 ordinary hours – not just 7.6. Paying 7.6 ordinary and the rest as overtime may be more costly than it needs to be. Beyond 10 hours, or outside the 8am–6pm span, is overtime, plus the sleepover allowance for each night.

We would, however, encourage you to seek advice on your own individual business circumstances.

No. On a weekend excursion the ordinary span is 6am to 8pm. Only the part outside the span (5am to 6am) is paid as overtime. From 6am onwards the hours fall within the span and are paid at the Saturday or Sunday penalty rate, not the whole shift at a night rate.

Work outside the ordinary span on an excursion is overtime, not a shift penalty. Rostering two workers does not change that. Each worker’s hours outside the span attract overtime and you cannot convert them into a shift loading.

On excursions, the overnight stay is covered by the sleepover arrangement (allowance, own room, board). The usual 10-hour between-shift break can be reduced to 8 hours by agreement where a sleepover is involved. The key requirement is a genuine 8-hour continuous sleep opportunity overnight.

The 40 minutes of active work during the night is paid as overtime with a one-hour minimum, not a 2-hour minimum (the 2-hour minimum is for recalls to a workplace, not sleepover/excursion interruptions). As for rest before the next shift, a brief overnight interruption sits within the sleepover arrangement, so the normal between-shift break rules for sleepovers (8 hours by agreement) apply rather than a separate recall rest rule.

TOIL is available by agreement in place of overtime pay, and there is no rule preventing a casual from agreeing to it, though in practice casuals are usually paid out their overtime. If you want to offer TOIL to a casual, put the agreement in writing and make sure the hours are banked and taken correctly.

The excursion and sleepover provisions cover overnight stays away from home for excursion-type work (camps, respite, weekends away and similar). Nothing in the Award says these arrangements have to be within Australia.

We would, however, encourage you to seek advice on your own individual business circumstances.

Yes, in effect. On an excursion the overnight sleepover provides the rest, so the next day’s ordinary hours (within the 8am to 6pm span on a weekday, up to 10 hours) are paid as ordinary time, with overtime for any hours outside the span. Since June 2026 the sleepover is not a “break between shifts” in the technical sense, but on an excursion it does provide the overnight rest.

Yes. On excursions, each overnight stay attracts the sleepover allowance, including on weekends. Weekend penalty rates also apply to the active hours actually worked.

They apply to all employees, including full-time, part-time and casual staff and support workers. They are not limited to casuals.

Remote work covers authorised work done outside rostered hours and away from a workplace. Recall covers being asked to return to a workplace after finishing a shift.

Remote work has its own pay rates (clause 25.10). Outside 6am–8pm, or over 10 hours in a day, it is paid at 150%/200% for permanents (175%/225% for casuals); over 38 hours a week it is the overtime rate; weekends and public holidays have their own rates. Importantly, these remote-work rates replace (they are not added on top of) other penalty or overtime rates.

No. The 30-minute minimum applies to on-call work in the 10pm to 6am window, and the 15-minute minimum applies from 6am to 10pm. A call from 9:58pm to 10:00pm starts in the 6am to 10pm window, so the 15-minute minimum applies. The time the work starts sets the window.

Remote work is paid under the remote-work rates, which substitute for shift and overtime rates. Work at/after 8pm falls outside the 6am–8pm span, so the remote-work rate applies (150% for permanents, 175% for casuals), with the 15-minute on-call minimum, not a separate evening shift loading.

Yes. The on-call allowance (paid for being available) is separate from, and additional to, the payment for actually performing work. When an on-call employee takes a call they receive both the daily on-call allowance and the minimum payment for the work (15 minutes during the day, 30 minutes overnight) at the applicable rate.

Paying an average amount risks an underpayment if an employee has weeks where they work an unusual amount of overtime. Your obligation is to make sure an employee is paid sufficiently in each pay period.

You could consider entering into an Individual Flexibility Arrangement to alter the terms of the Award, but you would need advice on your own individual circumstances.

There is no specific Award cancellation payment for a cancelled remote meeting for permanent staff. They are paid their ordinary hours regardless. The 1-hour remote minimum is only triggered when work is actually performed, so if the meeting does not go ahead and no work is done, the minimum is not triggered. If a casual was engaged specifically for it, minimum engagement considerations may arise.

The between-shift break rules are about rostered shifts. Authorised remote work outside rostered hours is paid under the remote-work clause (a 1-hour minimum when not on call) and does not neatly create a “shift” for break purposes. 

That said, be mindful of fatigue. Regularly requiring after-hours case notes on top of a full roster creates both payroll and work health and safety risks. If remote work pushes total hours past the daily/weekly limits, the overtime-style remote rates apply.

Yes, potentially. Training attracts a 1-hour minimum payment, but the rate depends on when it is done. Weekday daytime is the base remote-work rate, whereas Saturday and late-night/out-of-span work attract higher remote-work rates (for example Saturday is 150% for permanents, 175% for casuals). So employee B (10pm Saturday) would be paid more than employee A (10am Wednesday), even on the same base rate.

The 6–8pm work is paid at the ordinary rate, not overtime. For part-time employees, SCHADS triggers overtime only once they exceed 38 hours/week (76/fortnight) or 10 hours/day or shift. Here the employee is well under 38 hours and works about 9.6 hours that day, so no overtime applies. 

If the group is run remotely, clause 25.10 applies, but on these facts (weekday, within 6am–8pm, under 38 hours/week and 10 hours/day) it’s still the ordinary hourly rate, with a one-hour minimum and no overtime added on top (cl 25.10(d)(ii)).

The 2-hour minimum engagement applies to being called in to physically work a shift. Training and meetings performed remotely have their own 1-hour minimum under the remote work clause, so paying 1 hour for remote training is compliant. If you instead require the employee to attend in person, the minimum engagement rules (which can be 2 hours) apply. (See next answer).

No. Remote work applies to work done away from a workplace. Attending in person at the office is attendance at a workplace, so the remote work clause does not apply. The usual minimum engagement rules apply instead, which are usually two or three hours depending on the employee’s classification and the work they are performing.

A recall is being asked to return to a workplace after finishing and leaving. It carries a 2-hour minimum at overtime rates for each recall, regardless of total hours or the span, and it applies to casuals too. The 10-hour and 12-hour span points relate to when overtime is triggered generally. The recall minimum is a separate, standalone entitlement.

An Individual Flexibility Arrangement can alter the way the Award works. We encourage you to get advice on your own individual circumstances.

An Individual Flexibility Arrangement can vary overtime and penalty arrangements, but only if the employee is better off overall. The simplest way is to show that employees will be paid more under an arrangement than under the Award, for example through a higher base rate of pay for ordinary hours. You could also consider providing extra paid leave or other benefits.

They are linked but separate. The right to disconnect lets employees reasonably refuse to monitor or respond to contact outside working hours. If you are paying employees to perform remote work in accordance with the Award, that work is not outside their working hours, so the right to disconnect will not be relevant.

A blanket policy requiring staff to answer calls outside hours can conflict with the right to disconnect if the contact is unreasonable. If after-hours contact is genuinely needed, the better approach is a clear, paid on-call arrangement (on-call allowance plus payment for work performed). A policy that expects unpaid availability is both a right to disconnect risk and an underpayment risk.

The client cancellation provision (clause 25.5) applies only to full-time and part-time employees, not casuals. For casuals, cancellation is governed by their terms of engagement and any minimum engagement. There is no Award right to redirect, make up or pay under clause 25.5 for casuals.

If a client cancels and you lawfully redirect the employee to suitable alternative work (that they are qualified for and where it is practicable), and the employee unreasonably refuses, you generally do not have to pay them for refusing available work. The redirect option is one of the employer’s choices under clause 25.5, so if the employee declines suitable work offered, the obligation to pay for that time falls away. Make sure you document the offer and the refusal.

Yes, that is the “redirect” option. On a client cancellation you can direct a full-time or part-time employee to perform other suitable work (a different task or location) that they are qualified for and where practicable, such as cleaning your gym, and pay them their normal wage for the rostered time. Make sure the alternative work is reasonable and within their capability.

Under 24-hour care (clause 25.8) the employee is paid for 8 hours of work at 155% for the whole 24-hour period, and must receive 8 hours’ continuous uninterrupted sleep plus board and lodging. The remaining time is downtime at the client’s home where they are present but not actively working. If actual active care exceeds 8 hours, the extra is paid as overtime (time-and-a-half for the first 2 hours, then double time).

Yes, this will be updated automatically in Employment Hero payroll.

What you can charge a participant is governed by the NDIS and funder pricing rules, not the Award. The Award only sets what you must pay the employee ($1.05 per km for the six-month period). Whether you can pass $1.05 on to a participant depends on the applicable NDIS price limits or your service agreement, so check the NDIS pricing arrangements.

The levies are paid into the pooled scheme fund and are generally not refundable to the employer if the employee leaves before qualifying. That is how a pooled scheme works. The employee’s service record is preserved for a period so they can resume if they return to the sector. If they never return and never qualify, no leave is paid out and the employer’s levies are not refunded. It is a pooled scheme, not an individual account.

Victoria has a portable long service benefit scheme covering the community services sector (among others), administered by the Portable Long Service Authority. As in NSW, employers register, lodge returns and pay a levy on ordinary wages, and the scheme pays the benefit once the worker accrues enough service across employers. The qualifying period and levy rate are set by the Victorian scheme, so check the Authority’s current settings.

This will depend on the type of therapy being provided and the setting it is provided in. Please contact us for more information.

We are not aware of any plans for this to be introduced in Tasmania.

Travel to and from work is generally unpaid.

For home care employees, time spent travelling between clients during the day is paid, and vehicle and travel allowances also apply. These sit in the travel and allowances provisions of the Award (broadly clauses 20 and 25).

Broken shift arrangements and the associated allowance are dealt with in clause 25.6. A broken shift with one unpaid break attracts one allowance, and a broken shift with two unpaid breaks attracts a higher allowance.

If the employee is simply travelling and staying overnight, it is not a sleepover, so the sleepover allowance does not apply.

The payments the employee is entitled to, and the expenses they can be reimbursed for, depend on the reason for the travel, the work they are performing and other factors. Please contact us for further information.

No trainee-specific changes were announced as part of the 2026/2027 package. Trainees remain covered by the Award’s training arrangements and the national training wage provisions. They will be affected by the general changes that apply to everyone, such as the new classification structure from 1 October 2027 and any applicable wage increases.