Licensees

Industrial Relations

Licensees who have staff in their LPO have three main options for determining wages:

1. The federal Postal Services Industry Award

2. Australian Workplace Agreements

3. The relevant State Retail Award

The Postal Services Industry Award was ratified by the Australian Industrial Relations Commission in 2003. Several hundred LPOs are bound to pay under this Award. Those LPOs are listed in the back of the Award. The Award may be downloaded from www.wagenet.gov.au.

LPOs that are not bound to pay under the Award have the option to pay under their relevant State Retail Award.

All Licensees may use AWAs with the agreement of their employees.

In late August 2004, the CEPU logged a further 450 LPOs with a view to "roping them in" to the Award. POAAL has again offered to represent these logged Licensees in the AIRC at no additional cost to individual Licensees. Affected Licensees may ring the POAAL National Office for more information.

• If your LPO is respondent to the Award, your staff are not obliged to become members of the CEPU.

• If your LPO is not respondent to the Award, you are note obliged to pay under the Postal Services Industry Award.

• Licensees may choose to employ their staff under and Australian Workplace Agreement. For more information on AWAs, refer to the Office of the Employment Advocate website at http://www.oea.gov.au/.

The AIRC hearing regarding the CEPU's second log of claims against Licensed Post Offices was held on 16 November. POAAL represented the majority of Licensees at this hearing. Commissioner Grainger found that there was a dispute between the CEPU and a number of LPOs. A further hearing was scheduled for early January 2005 to decide whether or not a dispute will be found against those remaining LPOs who had not responded to the log.

The second hearing regarding the most recent log of claims from the CEPU was held at the AIRC in Melbourne on 7 January 2005. POAAL attended the hearing in Melbourne, representing all those Licensees who had instructed POAAL to act on their behalf.

Following the previous AIRC hearing in November 2004 the CEPU was instructed to send further information to the small number of Licensees against whom they sought a dispute finding but who had not authorised POAAL to act for them or had not responded directly to the CEPU or AIRC.

The Commission directed the CEPU to finalise the list of Licensees against whom they are seeking a dispute finding.

The next step in this process will most likely be that the CEPU will seek to "rope in" those Licensees who have had a dispute found against their business. This means that those Licensees will be made respondent to the Postal Services Industry Award, and will be bound to pay their staff under the terms and conditions of the Award.

Common Rule Application by the CEPU

POAAL appeared in the Australian Industrial Relations Commission on 16 December 2004 on behalf of all Victorian Licensees. The CEPU has applied to the AIRC to make the Postal Services Industry Award common rule for all eligible LPOs in Victoria. In short, this means that all Victorian LPOs where postal business is the dominant business will be obliged to pay under the Award. The exceptions will be LPOs where AWAs are in place, or where the postal business is not the dominant business. The CEPU wanted coverage to commence from 1 January 2005, however the Commissioner agreed with POAAL's argument and the common rule coverage will commence from 1 February 2005.

Subscribe to the Postal Services Industry Award at WageNet

In early 2005 POAAL wrote to the Minister for Workplace Relations pointing out that the WageNet website was not user friendly for Licensees seeking the most up-to-date information on the Postal Services Industry Award.

The Minister asked the Department to contact POAAL and we pointed out ways in which Licensees could more easily access information on wages.

One of the things that Licensees can do in this regard is to sign up for free updates on the federal Postal Services Industry Award at the WageNet website.

Visit the subscription page of Wagenet and enter your email address and the code for the Postal Services Industry Award - AW830245. You will then be notified of any changes to the Award, such as safety net wage adjustments. If you change your email address you will need to re-subscribe.

It's a free service, so don't delay in signing up so that you can be kept up-to-date of any changes to the federal Postal Services Industry Award.

This is just another way in which POAAL helps its members.

History of the Postal Services Industry Award

In 2002, several hundred Licensees across Australia received an ambit log of claims from the CEPU. The union wanted a minimum rates award for LPO staff.

Most of the logged Licensees authorised POAAL to represent them in these discussions.

The first hearing was held at the AIRC on 9 July 2002. POAAL strongly rejected the claim. A dispute was found.

There was a supplementary hearing at the AIRC on 19 September 2002, adding LPOs to the log of claim.

On 12 May 2003 POAAL, representing the vast majority of Licensees logged by the CEPU, appeared in the Australian Industrial Relations Commission to continue discussions with regard to the creation of a minimum rates Postal Industry Award.

POAAL outlined its points of disagreement with the draft award supplied by the CEPU. The parties entered into conciliation, and Senior Deputy President Kaufman assisted with discussions. Both POAAL and the CEPU considered a number of issues in the light of discussions in the AIRC.

The Draft Award was reviewed and revised by the Award Simplification Unit of the Commission. The Award Simplification Unit brought several matters to the attention of the interested parties and discussions took place and it was resolved in November 2003. It was a long and involved process with POAAL representing the vast majority of logged Licensees with a determination that a just and fair Minimum Rates Award would be established.

In 2004 the CEPU applied to vary the Award with respect to the recent Safety Net Adjustment. The CEPU also made application to vary the Award to reflect the recent full-bench AIRC decision relating to redundancy. This second application involves changes to the redundancy, termination and dispute resolution clauses. POAAL circulated the proposed variations to a range of committee members and an external consultant for their comments.

POAAL met with the CEPU prior to the AIRC hearing and sought clarification on a number of issues. It is worth noting that many of the redundancy provisions relate only to LPOs where there are more than fifteen employees.

At the AIRC hearing POAAL sought to make amendments to the Award to aid Licensees in interpreting the Award, however Senior Deputy President Kaufmann refused on the basis that it would be going against decisions made by the full bench of the AIRC. The CEPU, however, made an undertaking to POAAL to assist POAAL to inform Licensees of the new redundancy provisions.

The wage increases took effect from the first pay period in August 2004.