Under the Restaurant Industry Award MA000119, read against the award text by Skai Solutions on 5 September 2026, a published roster can be changed only by mutual agreement or with 7 days' notice, and every employee must get 8 full days off in a 4 week period.
A roster change looks free. It is a message on a Tuesday afternoon. The cost shows up in three places, and only one of them is on a payslip.
The first is wages. If you cover a hole with a casual instead of a permanent, you pay the 25% casual loading on every hour. On the Restaurant Industry Award MA000119 rates published by the Fair Work Ombudsman on 24 June 2026, a Level 2 food and beverage attendant is on A$27.08 an ordinary hour and a casual at the same level is A$33.85. A six hour Saturday gap filled by a casual is A$203.10 in ordinary time against A$162.48 if a permanent had been rostered on properly in the first place. Over a year that is real money, and it is money spent on nothing the customer can see.
The second is the clause you break by accident. Clause 15.1 of the award sets limits that a quick swap ignores. An employee who is not a casual needs a minimum break of 10 hours between finishing ordinary hours on one day and starting the next, and 8 hours for a changeover of rosters. Move somebody from a Friday close to a Saturday open and you can breach that with one message.
The third is the one nobody counts. A roster that changes every week is the main reason good staff leave, and replacing them costs more than the loading ever did.
Seven days, unless the employee agrees to less. That is clause 15.3(d) of the Restaurant Industry Award MA000119: the roster of an employee may be changed at any time by the employer and employee by mutual agreement, or by the employer giving the employee 7 days' notice of the change.
Rostered days off get more. Clause 15.4(a) says an employer must, where practicable, give a minimum of 2 weeks' notice of any rostered day off. A rostered day off can be moved by mutual agreement or for a reason beyond your control, which is where sickness sits.
Notice is not the only obligation, and this is the part most operators miss. Clause 33 of the award is a separate duty to consult. If you propose to change the regular roster or ordinary hours of an employee whose hours are not irregular or sporadic, you have to tell them what the change is and when it starts, invite their views on the impact including on their family or caring responsibilities, and actually consider what they say. Seven days' notice with no conversation is not compliance with clause 33. The Fair Work Ombudsman sets out the same duty on its rosters page.
Yes, and the award gives three different answers depending on how the person is employed. The seven day rule above is clause 15.3(d) and it covers full time and part time rosters. Clause 10 sits underneath it and restricts what a part time roster can be changed to at all, which is the one that catches operators out.
| How they are employed | What you can change, and how | Clause |
|---|---|---|
| Casual | Any shift, subject only to the 2 consecutive hour minimum engagement. There are no guaranteed hours to protect | 11.3 |
| Part time | Shifts inside their agreed availability, on 7 days' notice. Their guaranteed hours, only with written consent. Hours outside their availability, never | 10.4, 10.5, 10.7(a), 15.3(d) |
| Full time | 7 days' notice, plus the separate clause 33 duty to consult | 15.3(d), 33 |
Clause 10.4 requires that when you engage a part time employee you agree with them in writing on two things: the number of hours guaranteed to be provided and paid, and the days and the hours on those days during which they are available to work them. Clause 10.5 then says any change to those guaranteed hours may only be made with the written consent of the employee. Seven days' notice does not reach them. A conversation in the corridor does not either.
Clause 10.7(a) is stricter again. A part time employee must not be rostered to work any hours outside their agreed availability, with any amount of notice at all. Clause 10.7(b) sets their daily floor at 3 hours rather than the 2 that applies to a casual, and a ceiling of 11.5, and clause 10.7(c) gives them 2 days off each week.
There is exactly one route by which guaranteed hours change without written consent, and the employee starts it, not you. Under clause 10.11, an employee with a genuine and ongoing change in personal circumstances may alter the times they are available by giving 14 days' written notice. If you cannot reasonably accommodate it, clause 10.12 says that regardless of clause 10.5 the guaranteed hours cease to apply and the two of you must agree a new set.
Clause 10.8 runs the other way, and it turns a habit into an entitlement. If a part time employee has regularly worked more ordinary hours than their guaranteed hours for at least 12 months, they may request in writing that you increase the guaranteed hours, and under clause 10.10 you may only refuse on reasonable business grounds, in writing, with the grounds stated.
Before any of that, the size of the roster is set by the wage budget rather than by the rules: how many staff a cafe needs works the hours out from the ATO labour band. The honest summary: a casual roster is the flexible one and the 25% loading is what that flexibility costs. A part time roster is cheaper per hour because it is a written agreement, not a whiteboard, and most of the risk in changing rosters sits on people who were put on part time contracts to save the loading. Clause text read at awards.fairwork.gov.au on 14 September 2026.
For a full time employee and for a part time employee's shift times inside their agreed availability, yes, on seven days' notice, and for a full timer the clause 33 duty to consult runs alongside it. For a part time employee's guaranteed hours, no. Clause 10.5 requires written consent and no amount of notice substitutes for it. For a casual there is nothing to change, because there are no guaranteed hours in the first place.
Two traps sit inside that. The first is that agreement reached in a corridor is not written consent, and an operator who relies on it has a variation that does not exist. The second is clause 10.7(a): a part time employee must not be rostered outside their agreed availability at all, with any notice, so a change that looks minor on paper can be one the award simply does not permit.
The practical route when you need more than the award gives you is to fix the availability agreement rather than the roster. Availability is agreed in writing under clause 10.4 and it can be varied in writing. Changing it once, properly, is cheaper than negotiating every week and safer than a change that cannot be made.
What a short notice change actually costs is set out above, and if the reason you are changing rosters is that someone has called in sick, the sequence for that is on restaurant staff calling in sick. The award rates that make the recalculation worth doing are on which award covers my restaurant. This is general information about the award text, not advice on your situation.
These are the working limits from clause 15 and clauses 10 and 11, at the award text as it stands on 5 September 2026. They are the ones that get broken by a whiteboard change on a busy Friday.
| Rule | What the award says | Clause |
|---|---|---|
| Minimum ordinary hours in a day, full time | 6, excluding meal breaks | 15.1(a) |
| Maximum ordinary hours in a day | 11.5, excluding meal breaks | 15.1(b) |
| Long days in a row | More than 10 ordinary hours on more than 3 consecutive days earns a break of at least 48 hours afterwards | 15.1(c) |
| Long days in a cycle | Maximum 8 days over 10 ordinary hours in a 4 week cycle | 15.1(d) |
| Break between shifts | 10 hours, or 8 hours for a roster changeover. Not casuals | 15.1(e) |
| Days off | Minimum 8 full days off in a 4 week period | 15.1(f) |
| Split shifts | Maximum spread of 12 hours | 15.1(g) |
| Posting the roster | Must show each name and start and finish times, and be posted somewhere employees can easily get to it | 15.3(b), 15.3(c) |
| Changing the roster | Mutual agreement, or 7 days' notice | 15.3(d) |
| Notice of a rostered day off | 2 weeks where practicable | 15.4(a) |
| Casual maximum | 12 hours a day or shift, 38 hours a week or an average of 38 over a roster cycle of no more than 4 weeks | 11.2 |
| Casual minimum engagement | 2 consecutive hours, paid | 11.3 |
The 2 consecutive hour minimum is worth reading twice before you call somebody in for a 90 minute rush. We cover that floor in more detail on minimum shift hours in hospitality, including how it differs on the Fast Food Award, and the loading itself on casual loading in Australian hospitality.
You can ring. They can decline, and since 26 August 2024 that refusal has legal protection.
Clause 15A of the Restaurant Award carries the employee right to disconnect under section 333M of the Fair Work Act. Unless it is unreasonable to do so, an employee may refuse to monitor, read or respond to contact from their employer outside working hours. Clause 15A.2 sets the start dates: 26 August 2024 for employers that were not small business employers on that date, and 26 August 2025 for those that were. Clause 15A.3 says an employer must not directly or indirectly prevent an employee from exercising that right.
So the informal fix that every venue in the country relies on, which is texting four people at 4pm until one says yes, is now something staff can lawfully ignore. That does not make it useless. It makes it unreliable, which is a worse property in a fix you depend on.
Some venues are genuinely short of people, and no amount of roster hygiene fixes a market. Australia's hospitality labour shortage is the background to most of this, and we set out the measured picture on the hospitality staff shortage in Australia. If you are structurally short, the honest answer is that you have to take work off the roster rather than find more people to put on it.
Phone answering is the easiest thing to take off, because it is the only job in the venue that nobody is trained for and everybody does. A Skai Solutions AI receptionist answers every call at once, including at 7pm on a Saturday when the person you rostered on the floor is carrying three plates. It does not fix a short roster. It stops the roster you have from being spent on the handset.
One more thing worth knowing if you also run a venue across the Tasman: New Zealand has no equivalent of clause 15. There is no statutory minimum shift length and no 7 day roster notice rule. Instead, under section 67D of the Employment Relations Act an availability provision is void without guaranteed hours, genuine reasons and reasonable compensation, and Employment New Zealand states that where an agreement has no valid shift cancellation provision and the employer cancels anyway, the employee must be paid as if they had worked it. Different country, different trap.
One rostering decision has a price tag most operators never see: if a late closer is rostered back on inside eight hours, the overtime rate continues until they get the break. Our page on when the hospitality award pays overtime goes through that clause and the rates.
Award rates change every 1 July, an enterprise agreement overrides the award, and juniors, apprentices, overtime bands and split shifts all sit outside the simple tables above. For a specific person in a specific classification, use the Fair Work Pay and Conditions Tool rather than any page on the internet, including this one. If your labour line is the real problem rather than the roster, start with restaurant labour cost percentage.
Skai Solutions answers every call at once, so the person you rostered for the floor stays on the floor. Fully set up in five days.
Book a Free DemoRoster discipline is the cheapest retention lever there is. Why restaurant staff turnover is so high prices what one replacement costs on award rates and ranks the four fixes cheapest first.
When the roster has to be rebuilt mid week because somebody walked out, the clause 15 limits on this page are what constrain you. Staff quit without notice works through covering the shift inside those limits, and what the award lets you withhold.
The other clause that governs the same grid is breaks, and it is the one that charges you for getting it wrong. Do you have to pay staff for breaks covers clause 16 of the Restaurant Industry Award, the 50 per cent extra owed for a meal break you did not give, and the New Zealand statutory table.
One more thing the roster has to carry: a trained first aider on every shift. What first aid cover a restaurant needs explains why the one per 25 workers ratio leaves a three shift venue uncovered for most of its trading hours.
Whether you can change a roster at all depends first on how the person is engaged. See casual versus part time in hospitality, where clause 10.5 requires a part timer's written consent to any change in guaranteed hours.
If you roster staff around cameras, the placement matters more than the policy. A staff room camera is the one that produces complaints, because it records private conversations. See restaurant camera and audio rules in Australia.
Seven days, unless the employee agrees to the change. Clause 15.3(d) of the Restaurant Industry Award MA000119 allows a roster to be changed by mutual agreement or by the employer giving 7 days' notice. A rostered day off carries a separate requirement of 2 weeks' notice where practicable, under clause 15.4(a).
A minimum of 8 full days off in a 4 week period, under clause 15.1(f) of the Restaurant Industry Award MA000119.
For ordinary hours the maximum is 11.5 hours in a day excluding meal breaks, under clause 15.1(b). A casual may be engaged for a maximum of 12 hours per day or shift under clause 11.2. An employee under 18 must not be required to work more than 10 hours in a shift.
Both. Clause 33 of the award requires you to consult employees affected by a proposed change to a regular roster or ordinary hours, give them information about the change, invite their views on the impact including on family or caring responsibilities, and consider those views. That duty sits on top of the 7 days' notice in clause 15.3(d).
Yes, unless refusing is unreasonable. Clause 15A of the award applies the right to disconnect under section 333M of the Fair Work Act, from 26 August 2024 for larger employers and 26 August 2025 for small business employers. An employer must not directly or indirectly prevent an employee from exercising it.
No. New Zealand has no award and no statutory minimum shift length or roster notice period. Instead, an availability provision is only valid under section 67D of the Employment Relations Act where the agreement specifies guaranteed hours, there are genuine reasons on reasonable grounds and reasonable compensation is paid.
Related: which award covers your restaurant or cafe, and what a public holiday surcharge needs to recover.