Security Services Industry Award

The first threshold issue is whether the business is actually providing security services or whether the work sits only incidentally inside another industry.

• Covered security services include physical and electronic guarding, crowd and event control, close personal protection, control room work, loss prevention and incidental traffic control tied to covered security work.
• An employer is not covered merely because another award covered business has staff who perform some security functions incidentally.
• Special exclusions apply to cash in transit business lines, prisons and detention facilities, alarm installation or repair and ATM installation, maintenance, repair or replenishment.

A site name or client contract does not decide the level. The actual security tasks performed do that work under this award.

• Employees must be classified in accordance with Schedule A, and they must perform duties incidental to their work and within their skill, competence and training.
• Level 1 covers general guarding, basic crowd control, access and exit control, simple scanner or CCTV use and basic alarm response.
• The work can be done individually or in a team and under general supervision.

Security payroll often goes wrong because the role is classified by location instead of by the skill, system use and responsibility the employee actually carries.

• Level 2 adds first response to security incidents, multi site vehicle patrol, more advanced electronic monitoring, airport screening, dog handling and frisk search work.
• Level 3 moves into more complex instructions, more advanced computer use and a higher level of independent work.
• The business should review roles again when a guard moves from basic static guarding into screening, monitoring or higher skill control work.

Security rosters need to be built around the award's minimum and maximum shift rules, especially where 12 hour patterns are being considered.

• Full time ordinary hours can be worked over roster cycles from 2 to 8 weeks.
• Ordinary working time includes specified non post time such as required records, handover related tasks and directed training that falls within the clause.
• Minimum and maximum ordinary shift lengths are set by employment type, and 12 hour ordinary shifts require majority agreement plus health, supervision, break and review safeguards recorded in writing.

The common payroll misses in security are acting up time, broken shifts and supervision, especially on sites with changing deployment needs.

• If an employee performs higher duties for more than 4 hours on a day or shift, the higher classification rate applies for the whole day or shift.
• If the higher duties last 4 hours or less, the higher rate applies only for the time worked at that level.
• A rostered shift worked in 2 periods triggers the broken shift allowance, and supervising employees triggers the supervision allowance.

Pay timing is more prescriptive than many businesses expect, so payroll calendars and termination workflows need to match the award.

• The employer may choose a weekly or fortnightly pay period.
• The award sets pay day timing rules that change when a public holiday falls in the pay week.
• On termination, wages and other amounts required by the clause must be paid no later than 7 days after the day employment ends.

PR799297, PR799454

The current consolidated award incorporates these recent variation determinations. Use the consolidated wording when checking any affected clause, schedule, rate or allowance.

Affected: 14 - Breaks, 15 - Minimum rates, 17 - Allowances, 19 - Overtime, 20 - Penalty rates, 21 - Annual leave, Schedule B - Summary of Hourly Rates of Pay, Schedule C - Summary of Monetary Allowances