It is A$5.60 a day under the Hospitality Award where the gap between shifts runs more than 3 hours, A$3.69 where the gap is 2 to 3 hours, and nothing at all if the employee is casual.
Skai Solutions fetched both award texts to write this, because the two hospitality awards do not pay split shifts the same way and the pay guide summaries do not say so. Below: the current figures, why the same roster costs different amounts on MA000009 and MA000119, who is excluded, and what a loaded rate does and does not absorb.
A split shift is one day's work broken into two or more periods with an unpaid gap in the middle, which in hospitality almost always means a lunch service, a dead afternoon, then dinner. Both hospitality awards pay an allowance for it, and both pay it on top of the hourly rate rather than inside it.
Under the Hospitality Industry (General) Award MA000009, clause 26.14, the allowance is A$3.69 a day where the gap between shifts is between 2 and 3 hours, and A$5.60 a day where the gap is more than 3 hours. Under the Restaurant Industry Award MA000119, clause 21.3(b), it is a single figure of A$5.60 "for each separate work period of 2 hours or more". Both sets of figures are the ones that took effect from the first full pay period on or after 1 July 2026, under variation PR799290.
This is the part that is worth your attention, because it is not in any pay guide summary. The two awards do not just set different dollar figures. They pay on a different unit.
| Award | Clause | Unit | Trigger | Amount |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Hospitality MA000009 | 26.14(b)(i) | Per day | Gap of 2 to 3 hours | A$3.69 |
| Hospitality MA000009 | 26.14(b)(ii) | Per day | Gap of more than 3 hours | A$5.60 |
| Restaurant MA000119 | 21.3(b) | Per work period | Each separate period of 2 hours or more | A$5.60 |
So a hotel bistro running a 11am to 2pm lunch, a three and a half hour break, then a 5.30pm to 9.30pm dinner pays one employee A$5.60 for that day. A standalone restaurant running the identical roster is reading a clause that attaches the allowance to work periods, not to days, and there are two qualifying work periods in that roster.
We are not going to tell you the restaurant award therefore costs A$11.20, because we have not verified how Fair Work applies that wording to a lunch and dinner split in practice and we are not going to guess at it. What we will say plainly is that the wording is different, the exposure is different, and if you run split shifts on MA000119 this is a question worth putting to the Fair Work Pay and Conditions Tool or to an adviser on your own roster rather than assuming the two awards work the same way. They demonstrably do not.
No. Clause 26.14(a) of the hospitality award says the allowance "applies to any full-time or part-time employee who works split shifts on any day". Casuals are not in that sentence, and the restaurant award's clause 21.3(b) sits in the same wage-related allowance schedule with the same limitation.
That matters more here than it would in almost any other industry, because hospitality runs on casuals. If your split shift roster is covered by casual staff, the allowance is not payable and the 25% casual loading is what they get instead. The loading is paid in place of annual leave, paid personal and carer's leave, notice and redundancy, not in place of allowances, so this is not a case of the loading absorbing it. The allowance simply does not reach casuals at all.
The practical consequence runs the other way too. If you convert a long serving casual to part time, that person starts attracting an allowance on every split day that they never attracted before. Our page on casual against part time in hospitality works through what else changes, and the casual loading page sets out what the 25% does and does not cover.
Here is the arithmetic on published figures. It is Skai Solutions' own worked example, not a measurement, so put your own roster through it.
Three part time food and beverage attendants on MA000009, each working a lunch and dinner split five days a week with a gap of more than 3 hours:
| Line | Amount |
|---|---|
| Allowance per person per day, clause 26.14(b)(ii) | A$5.60 |
| Five days | A$28.00 |
| Three people | A$84.00 a week |
| Over 52 weeks | A$4,368 |
If those same three gaps were trimmed to under three hours, the allowance drops to A$3.69 and the annual figure becomes A$2,878.20, a difference of A$1,489.80. Shortening the break is not automatically the right call, because a shorter gap means you are paying a wage across more of the dead afternoon. The point is only that the gap length is a lever and most operators do not know it is one.
Against a labour bill, this is small. The standard weekly rate the allowance is calculated from is A$1,119.10, so A$5.60 is half a percent of one week's wage for one classification. Allowances are not where your labour percentage is won or lost, and our page on restaurant labour cost percentage deals with the part that is. Allowances are where underpayment claims come from, which is a different and sharper risk.
Automatically, and you do not have to watch for a separate announcement. Both split shift figures are wage-related allowances expressed as a percentage of the standard weekly rate, which clause 2 of the hospitality award defines as the minimum weekly rate for a Level 4 classification, Cook (tradesperson) grade 3, in clause 18.1. That rate is A$1,119.10 from 1 July 2026.
The percentages are 0.33 for the 2 to 3 hour tier and 0.5 for the tier above it. When the Fair Work Commission moves award rates each July, the standard rate moves and both allowances move with it. That is why the figure is A$3.69 and not a round number: it is 0.33% of A$1,119.10. Our page on hospitality award rates carries the base rates these percentages are taken from, and the laundry allowance page covers the other allowance operators most often miss.
Partly, and the detail is the kind of thing that costs money when it is got wrong. Schedule I of the hospitality award lets an employer pay a full time employee classified at Level 3 or above a single loaded rate in satisfaction of overtime, most penalty rates and the split shift allowance. But clause I.2.1(a) names only clause 26.14(b)(i), the lower tier.
So a loaded rate covers the A$3.69 gap. It does not cover the gap of more than 3 hours. The award's own worked example in Schedule I puts the top-up at A$1.91, being the difference between the two tiers, payable on top of the loaded rate when the break runs long. Clause I.4(e) adds that where the period between shifts is 3 hours or less, a split shift allowance must still be paid, so a loaded rate arrangement does not make split shifts free in either direction.
One more constraint that bites on a split roster: clauses 15.1(c)(v) and 15.2(e) cap the maximum spread of hours for an employee working split shifts at 12. A 10am start therefore has to finish by 10pm, break included. If your dinner service runs past that, the roster is the problem and not the allowance. Our page on restaurant staff roster rules covers the notice side of changing one.
Ask why the split exists and the answer is almost always the same. You need someone on the floor at noon and someone on the floor at seven, and the four hours in between do not carry enough trade to pay a wage. So you break the shift, pay the allowance, and accept that the afternoon is covered by whoever happens to be in the building.
Which usually means the afternoon phone is covered by nobody. The booking calls for Friday night land in that gap, and an unanswered booking call is worth more than the whole week's split shift allowance for three people. A Skai Solutions AI phone agent answers every call through the dead afternoon, takes the booking into your system, and is live in five days. It does not remove the reason for the split shift. It removes the cost of nobody being there during it.
What is the split shift allowance in the restaurant award?
Clause 21.3(b) of the Restaurant Industry Award MA000119 sets it at A$5.60 for each separate work period of 2 hours or more, from the first full pay period on or after 1 July 2026. The Hospitality Industry (General) Award MA000009 is structured differently, paying A$3.69 or A$5.60 per day depending on the length of the gap.
How much is the split shift allowance in 2026?
A$3.69 a day under MA000009 clause 26.14(b)(i) where the break between shifts is 2 to 3 hours, and A$5.60 a day under 26.14(b)(ii) where it is more than 3 hours. MA000119 clause 21.3(b) sets A$5.60 per separate work period of 2 hours or more.
Do casuals get a split shift allowance?
No. Clause 26.14(a) applies the allowance to full-time and part-time employees only. A casual working a lunch and dinner split receives the 25% casual loading but no split shift allowance, because the loading replaces leave, notice and redundancy rather than allowances.
What counts as a split shift?
One day's work broken into two or more separate periods with an unpaid break between them that is longer than a meal break. Under MA000009 the allowance starts once that break reaches 2 hours.
Is there a maximum spread of hours for a split shift?
Yes. Clauses 15.1(c)(v) and 15.2(e) of MA000009 cap the maximum spread of hours at 12 for an employee who works split shifts, so first start to last finish cannot exceed 12 hours including the unpaid break.
Does a loaded rate cover the split shift allowance?
Only the lower tier. Schedule I clause I.2.1(a) lets a loaded rate satisfy clause 26.14(b)(i), the 2 to 3 hour gap. Where the break exceeds 3 hours the award's own example in Schedule I requires a further A$1.91, being the difference between the two tiers.
How does the split shift allowance go up each year?
It is a percentage of the standard weekly rate, which MA000009 defines as the Level 4 Cook (tradesperson) grade 3 rate of A$1,119.10 from 1 July 2026. The two tiers are 0.33% and 0.5% of that figure, so both move automatically when award rates move each July.