Annual Leave vs R&R on FIFO roster

[thunder]

Can an employer deduct annual leave from an employee's entitlements without informing them? Our employee was taking a management enforced break due to fatigue & illness. The employee assumed it was to be a combination of sick leave & accrued R&R days (nothing was put in writing by either party as to the type of leave). However the company has decided to terminate their employment contract & payroll need to know if they have correctly booked this time as annual leave.

[Qld IR Consultant]

If the absence is due to illness, regardless of whether it was employer initiated, then the employee will need to produce a medical certificate, then the employer must use accrued sick leave first. If the R&R leave (i assume accrued similar to TOIL) has not been documented it will be problematic, but if the employee decides to pursue compensation for it then all they need to do is demonstrate that they had worked it, which is easier to do than the employer trying to demonstrate that they didn't.

Do you have a enterprise agreement in place? If so what does it say?

[HeyPete]

Going to need more information, but from what you have mentioned it doesn't sound good.

Is the employee a casual employee? (this is irrelevent as they are on FIFO) roster
How long have they been working?
What is written in the Agreement?
Was the termination due to sickness?
Any history of poor performance?
Any performance management?

[thunder]

Hey Pete.

Worked for 1.5 years as a full time employee.

Termination was permitted under the agreement. The issue is not unfair dismissal, rather the non-payment of annual leave the employee thought they had accrued.

There is no history of poor performance, in fact had done an excellent job.

[HeyPete]

based on what you have explianed, the way I would read this is NO, you can't deduct annual leave.

Sec 88(1) of the FWA states 'Paid annual leave may be taken for a period agreed between an employee and his or her employer'

I'm not sure there was a mutual agreement there.

[thunder]

Thanks HeyPete