Peabody Energy Australia has signed an enforceable undertaking with the Fair Work Ombudsman after it back-paid more than $452,000, including superannuation and interest, to 24 Hunter workers.
The company rectified nearly $5 million to 197 underpaid workers across NSW and Queensland.
The underpaid employees, almost all of whom worked full-time, had duties in supervision, administration, production, warehousing, surveying, purchasing, geology, engineering and more.
They worked across 14 mine sites in Queensland and NSW.
The most affected NSW site was North Wambo.
Peabody admitted it did not pay out accrued and untaken personal leave to employees it made redundant. The company mistakenly believed the personal leave-related benefit was not due to employees under the Award.
It also failed to pay the allowance component of wages for accrued and outstanding annual leave for redundant employees, and the allowance component of their wages for the termination notice period for those who were made redundant.
Peabody had to rectify to its former employees a total of $4,982,070, including $988,568 in interest and $20,511 in superannuation after they were underpaid between January 2016 and April 2023.
Across all the employees, the lowest individual back payment was $272 and the highest was $91,013, excluding superannuation and interest.
An enforceable undertaking was considered appropriate because of the company's cooperation with the FWO's investigations, the full back payments, and the measures put in place to prevent future breaches - including an independent audit to check compliance in the future.
Fair Work Ombudsman Anna Booth urged employers to proactively check they are meeting their legal obligations.
"Checking compliance - as Peabody has committed to do going forward - is an important cornerstone of ensuring hardworking employees receive all they are owed under any relevant Award and the Fair Work Act," Ms Booth said.
"We welcome Peabody's back-payments of all impacted staff and their commitments to improve their processes so that there is ongoing compliance in the future. Importantly, we also welcome steps already taken, for example, Peabody's new guidelines for payroll, its provision of training for HR and payroll staff, and its new online system for recording and requesting leave."
A Peabody spokesman said the company had voluntarily disclosed the matter several years ago to the Fair Work Ombudsman and has since fully remediated all affected current and former employees.
"The Fair Work Ombudsman expressly acknowledges the matter has been rectified," the spokesman said.
"We've worked constructively with the Fair Work Ombudsman to resolve the matter and taken decisive steps to strengthen payroll compliance and governance across the business."
Mining and Energy Union general president Grahame Kelly said the incident reflected the sort of behaviour workers had come to expect from Peabody.
"While this American multinational has spent months locking out workers in an attempt to bully them into accepting less at the bargaining table, it has now also entered into an Enforceable Undertaking after rectifying almost $5 million in unpaid wages, superannuation and interest," he said.
"Peabody may have finally paid what it owed, but this is another example of a company that only seems to do the right thing when it's forced to.
"Whether it's denying workers their lawful entitlements or locking them out to pressure workers during enterprise bargaining, the pattern is the same: putting corporate interests ahead of the workers who create the company's wealth."
