Starting and leaving a job
Different types of employment agreements and arrangements
Casual work arrangements
Your rights as a casual worker
If thereโs no regular pattern to your work, and thereโs no expectation it will continue in the future, you and your employer can agree to a casual employment relationship.
If youโre a casual employee, your employer doesnโt have to offer you any work and you donโt have to accept any offer. If you work for the employer on one occasion, you have no guarantee of being offered more work later on.
Being a casual employee affects your employment in other specific areas. For example, casual employees can agree to receive their annual holiday pay on a โpay as you goโ basis (see: โWhen will I be paid if I take annual leave?โ).
Identifying whether youโre a casual or permanent worker
If thereโs doubt about whether youโre a casual or permanent employee, the key factors in deciding this will be how regular and how continuous the work is. This can be assessed by looking at both of the following:
- Your employment agreement โ Does it include terms that are inconsistent with casual employment? For example, it may require you to take work when itโs offered, or stop you from working for other employers, or require you to tell your employer when youโre not available for work.
- The behaviour of the two parties โ Has this created a fair and reasonable (โlegitimateโ) expectation that more work will be offered, or that it will be accepted if itโs offered? For example, if youโve been working a regular 30-hour week for six months, you might have a legitimate expectation of further work.
Whether youโre a casual employee or permanent employee will depend on what is actually happening in your employment relationship, not just the words that you and your employer have used to describe it. If your work is regular and ongoing, it is more likely that youโre a permanent employee.
If your employer calls you a โcasualโ employee but youโre wondering if you might really be a permanent employee, you can get advice from your union or local Community Law Centre.
Note: If youโre a casual employee and youโve accepted an offer of work, an employment relationship now exists. This means your boss canโt just cancel the shift last minute, and you have the same rights as other employees around pay and breaks for that shift. But, your employer doesnโt have to keep giving you shifts if they donโt want to, because the employment relationship is still casual.
