Celebrity chef George Calombaris’s MAdE Establishment has been ordered to pay $200,000 as a “contrition payment” for underpaying staff over $7.8 million for a long time under an Enforceable Undertaking (EU) with the Fair Work Ombudsman (FWO).
In an investigation led by the FTO into Jimmy Grants and the MAdE Establishment group of companies – the Hellenic Republic, Press Club and Gazi restaurants – after MAdE Establishment, in the early of 2017 found out the failure to correctly pay its employees, and immediately reached to the FWO entering into the enforceable undertaking, shows that the MAdE Establishment had long been underpaying its employees since 2011 to 17.
The MAdE group has already back-paid 515 current or former employees $7.83m at its Press Club, Gazi and three Hellenic Republic restaurants. Furthermore, Jimmy Grants was also found to have underpaid of $16,000 to nine employees.
In the statement released by the MAdE group, it tells that Jimmy Grants had “incorrectly classified some workers, for some employees the wrong award was applied.”
The Fair Work investigators held the MAdE restaurants responsible for underpaying “Significant amount” to employees owing to its incorrect application of annualized salary arrangement.
The investigation also revealed that the MAdE restaurants missed out on overtime and penalty rates and paying the correct award level to some workers.
The MAdE has made the commitments in EU to adhere to workplace compliance and implement systems and processes to monitor compliance at all times, to name few. In addition, as a part of the commitment in EU, Calombaris will be forced to complete speaking engagements to educate the industry on workplace compliance.
