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Australia security guards allegedly underpaid employees

Australia security guards allegedly underpaid employees

Danny Romero
| January 16, 2025

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Australia’s Fair Work Ombudsman launched legal action against the former operator of a Perth security company, alleging he committed ‘serious contraventions’ under the Fair Work Act through his involvement in underpaying workers, including more than AUD 900,000 (approximately USD 559,000).

Facing the court is Sergey Stanislavovich Navasardyan, who owned and operated the now deregistered company Griffon Alpha Group.

Griffon Alpha employed the workers on a casual basis to work at various venues and major events including sporting events, concerts, shopping centres, night clubs and commercial construction sites.

The regulator alleges that Navasardyan was involved in underpaying 44 security guards his company employed a total of AUD 911,292 (approximately USD 566,000) between December 2019 and May 2022.

Some of the workers were visa holders from non-English speaking backgrounds.

The regulator alleges that because the workers were underpaid knowingly and systematically, the contraventions meet the definition of ‘serious contraventions’ under the Fair Work Act, which attracts 10 times the maximum available penalties that would ordinarily apply.

The Ombudsman discovered the alleged breaches when auditing Griffon Alpha Group as part of surprise inspections of security businesses in Perth in 2021.

It is alleged the regulator discovered the company generally paid the workers flat rates of AUD 21 to AUD 25 per hour regardless of when they performed their duties, which was insufficient to cover a range of entitlements owed under the Security Services Award 2010 and 2020.

This allegedly resulted in underpayment of the workers’ casual loadings, penalty rates for weekend and public holiday work, overtime rates and shift allowances.

Fair Work Ombudsman Anna Booth said her agency was prepared to use all powers available to hold employers to account for alleged systematic exploitation of vulnerable workers.

“Employers who allegedly deliberately fail to provide their workers large parts of their lawful wages risk facing significant penalties, which have never been higher,” Booth said in a press release.

“Paying workers unlawfully low flat rates is simply unacceptable. In this case, it is alleged some workers were, for example, paid less than half their owed hourly rates on some Sundays,” Booth added.

SIA reached out to Griffon Alpha Group for comment.