The rules that move casual pay do not change often, but when they do it is usually on 1 July and usually all at once. This page is the dated record: what changed, when it took effect, who it affects, and where to read the authority rather than a summary of it.
Each entry links the regulator, because the regulator is the source of truth and we are not. Nothing here tells you what your obligations are. Your circumstances, your award, and any agreement covering your workplace all change the answer, so check your own position with Fair Work or the ATO before acting on anything below.
Last reviewed 3 September 2026
In force
Payday Super: superannuation moves with the pay cycle
Superannuation contributions are now tied to when wages are paid rather than to a quarterly cycle: the ATO sets a number of business days after each payday for the contribution to reach the fund, with a longer window for the first contribution for a new employee. The same law replaces "ordinary time earnings" with a new "qualifying earnings" base for working out the amount. For businesses paying casual workers frequently, super becomes something that has to happen alongside every pay run.
Who it affects: Every employer paying superannuation, but the operational impact is heaviest where pay cycles are short or irregular, which is most casual workforces.
The Fair Work Commission’s annual review outcome flows into the national minimum wage and into modern award minimum rates. Casual rates move with the base rate, and so does every penalty and loading calculated from it.
Who it affects: Any business paying award-covered staff. Rates differ by award and classification, so a single percentage figure does not tell you what your own rates became.
The right to disconnect extends to small business employees
Employees of small business employers gained the right to disconnect on 26 August 2025, a year after it started for everyone else on 26 August 2024. Fair Work describes it as an employee’s right to refuse to monitor, read or respond to contact from their employer outside working hours unless the refusal is unreasonable, and publishes the factors that go to what is reasonable.
Who it affects: Every employer. For shift-based workforces the practical question is how shift offers, roster changes and confirmations are sent outside rostered hours, and what a worker is expected to do with them.
The superannuation guarantee rate completed its legislated step-up and now sits at 12%. This was the final increase in the schedule. Until 30 June 2026 the rate applied to ordinary time earnings; from 1 July 2026 Payday Super changes the earnings base it is worked out on, so check the ATO’s current definition rather than an older on-cost table.
Who it affects: Every employer. For labour costing it matters because on-costs quoted against an older rate understate the true hourly cost of an employee.
Employee choice: the casual-to-permanent pathway opens
An eligible casual employee can notify their employer in writing that they believe they no longer meet the casual employee definition and want to change to full-time or part-time employment. The pathway opened on 26 February 2025 for employees of employers that are not small businesses, after six months of employment, and on 26 August 2025 for small business employees, after twelve months. Fair Work sets out how and when the employer has to respond, and the grounds on which a request can be declined.
Who it affects: Any business with casuals who have worked a regular pattern for six months or more. The notification comes from the employee, so the exposure is in how the response is handled, not in whether it arrives.
Intentional underpayment of wages became a criminal offence
Amendments to the Fair Work Act made it a criminal offence for an employer to intentionally underpay wages or entitlements. Fair Work says honest mistakes are not captured, and that the Fair Work Ombudsman decides whether a matter is referred for prosecution. Maximum penalties are expressed as imprisonment for an individual and as penalty units or a multiple of the underpayment, so the dollar figures change each 1 July and are not restated here: read them on the regulator’s page.
Who it affects: Every employer covered by the Fair Work Act. For casual workforces the practical question is whether every rate, loading and allowance on every payslip actually matches the award and the classification of the work performed, because that is where an underpayment usually starts.
Published alongside the criminal offence, the Code applies to employers with fewer than 15 employees. The Fair Work Ombudsman says it cannot refer a small business employer’s underpayment for possible criminal prosecution where it is satisfied the employer complied with the Code, and that any employer can ask about a cooperation agreement. The Code describes the steps the regulator treats as reasonable, which is useful reading for larger employers too.
Who it affects: Small business employers directly. Every other employer indirectly, because the Code is the clearest public statement of what the regulator expects an employer to have done to get pay right.
Amendments to the Fair Work Act introduced a new definition of casual employee. Fair Work describes two elements: the employment relationship has no firm advance commitment to continuing and indefinite work, assessed on its real substance, practical reality and true nature rather than on the label in the contract alone, and the employee is entitled to a casual loading or a specific casual rate of pay. Fair Work also explains the transitional arrangements for people who were already casual before 26 August 2024.
Who it affects: Any business engaging casual staff, particularly where someone described as casual has been working a regular, predictable pattern for an extended period.
When MyGig is the Employer of Record, these changes land on MyGig rather than on your payroll. Award rate movements flow into the engine that prices every hour, super is paid with wages at the current rate, and Single Touch Payroll is lodged directly from MyGig’s own payroll system. You keep running the roster.
How the award engine prices an hour is on compliance. Current casual rates by award are on casual award rates, and the daily pay cycle that Payday Super suits is on daily payroll.
Let the rules be our problem.
MyGig employs your casual workers and carries the compliance that comes with them. Sign up free, or bring your hardest award question to a demo.