Hospitality Award casual loading: how it works on weekends, nights and overtime

Short version: under the Hospitality Industry (General) Award 2020 (MA000009) a casual gets a 25% loading on the ordinary hourly rate. On Saturdays, Sundays and public holidays the casual rate already includes that loading. Monday-to-Friday evening and overnight work adds a flat amount per hour on top. Overtime is calculated on the ordinary hourly rate without the loading. And casuals must be engaged and paid for at least two consecutive hours. Separately, the law on who counts as a casual, and how a casual can move to permanent work, changed on 26 August 2024.

First: is it the Hospitality Award at all?

Not every food and drink business is covered by this award. The Hospitality Award covers employers in the hospitality industry, which includes hotels, motels, taverns and wine bars, resorts, caterers, casinos, accommodation businesses and function centres — and restaurants only where they operate in, or in connection with, premises run by an employer covered by this award. It also covers labour hire businesses that on-hire employees into the industry.

A stand-alone restaurant, café, reception centre or roadhouse is generally covered by the Restaurant Industry Award 2020 (MA000119) instead, and registered clubs have their own award. Where an enterprise agreement covers an employee, the award generally does not apply, although the agreement’s base pay cannot fall below the award’s. Settle which instrument applies before anything else — every figure below depends on it.

The 25% casual loading

The award requires a casual employee to be paid a loading of 25% on top of the ordinary hourly rate for each hour worked. Casuals do not get the paid leave and notice of termination that permanent employees do. The ordinary hourly rate itself depends on the classification — the award has an introductory level and levels 1 to 6, with separate junior rates and a managerial salary stream — so a casual classified too low is underpaid however the loading is applied.

Weekends, public holidays, evenings and nights

The award sets out penalty rates for ordinary hours by time and day, with a separate column for casuals that already includes the 25% loading:

Source: Hospitality Industry (General) Award 2020, Table 14 — Penalty rates, as consolidated to 1 July 2026. Percentages are of the ordinary hourly rate. The evening and overnight flat amounts are set in dollars in the award and change each year.

• Weekends and public holidays: the casual percentage already includes the loading. A casual working a Sunday is paid 175%, not 150% plus another 25%.
• Evenings and nights: the extra is a flat dollar amount for each hour or part of an hour, added to the 100% or 125% rate — not a percentage.
• Penalties do not stack: where more than one penalty rate would apply to the same hours, the employer pays the highest one only (a separate penalty for missed breaks can still apply on top).

Overtime for casuals

A casual can be engaged for up to 12 hours a day or shift, and up to 38 hours a week — or an average of 38 over a roster cycle of up to four weeks. Time beyond those limits is overtime. The award’s overtime rates are a percentage of the ordinary hourly rate, and its summary of casual overtime rates is calculated on that rate without the 25% loading:

• Monday to Friday: 150% for the first 2 hours, then 200%.
• Weekends: 200%.
• Public holidays: 250%.

This is a common source of error in both directions — adding the loading on top of the overtime rate, or applying weekday overtime to weekend hours. Other awards handle casual overtime differently, which is one more reason to confirm the award first.

Minimum engagement

A casual must be engaged and paid for at least 2 consecutive hours each time they are required to attend work. Sending someone home after an hour does not reduce what they are owed.

Who is a casual, and moving to permanent work

Since 26 August 2024, a person is a casual employee if, when they start, there is no firm advance commitment to continuing and indefinite work — judged on the real substance and practical reality of the relationship — and they are entitled to a casual loading or casual rate. A regular pattern of work does not, on its own, make someone permanent.

The old casual conversion rules were replaced on 26 August 2024 by the employee choice pathway in the National Employment Standards:

• A casual who has been employed for at least 6 months (12 months with a small business) and believes they no longer meet the casual definition can give their employer written notice that they want to change to full-time or part-time work.
• The employer must consult the employee and respond in writing within 21 days, either accepting the change or giving reasons for not accepting it.
• Reasons for refusing are limited — for example that the employee still meets the casual definition, or fair and reasonable operational grounds.
• Employment before 26 August 2024 does not count towards eligibility, and the older conversion pathways ended on 26 August 2025.

For the detail, including what labour hire businesses should do, see casual vs part-time work in labour hire.

Superannuation and records

From 1 July 2026, the super guarantee is 12% of an employee’s qualifying earnings and is paid for each payday, reaching the fund within 7 business days (with some exceptions). Qualifying earnings bring together ordinary time earnings, commissions, certain salary-sacrifice amounts and other amounts that already counted for super; the ATO says what counts as ordinary time earnings has not changed — casual loading and shift penalties count, but overtime does not where the award clearly identifies ordinary hours. See Payday Super for labour hire agencies.

Employers must keep time and wages records for 7 years — including loadings, penalty rates and allowances paid — and give each employee a pay slip within one working day of payday.

Where hospitality casual pay most often goes wrong

• The wrong award — a hotel restaurant paid under the Restaurant Award, or a stand-alone café under the Hospitality Award.
• Double-counting the loading on Saturdays, Sundays or public holidays.
• Evening and night extras treated as percentages instead of flat amounts per hour.
• The loading added to overtime, or weekday overtime rates used for weekend hours.
• Short shifts paid as worked when the award requires at least two hours.
• Rates not updated from the first full pay period on or after 1 July.
• Employee choice notices ignored, or answered after the 21-day window.

Where OnCrew fits, and where it does not

OnCrew does not interpret the award. It does not decide which award applies, classify workers, calculate casual loadings, penalty rates, evening amounts or overtime, or run payroll. That belongs in your payroll system and with the people who run it.

What OnCrew handles is the record that payroll starts from: shifts, actual clock-in and clock-out times stored as they happened (each clock-in is location-checked against the venue, while clock-out is time-stamped but not location-checked), supervisor approval from the phone, and an export of approved hours — the Employment Hero-format file carries each shift’s date, start and finish times, break and hours, which is what time-of-day rates depend on. Hours are the time between clock-in and clock-out less the unpaid break you configure, unless a site is set to pay the rostered shift. Your payroll system then applies the award. More on hospitality and events staffing.

Official sources checked for this guide (October 2026): Hospitality Industry (General) Award 2020 (consolidated to 1 July 2026) · Restaurant Industry Award 2020 · Fair Work Ombudsman — MA000009 summary · Fair Work Ombudsman — Pay and Conditions Tool · Fair Work Ombudsman — casual employees · Fair Work Ombudsman — becoming a permanent employee · Fair Work Ombudsman — about awards · Fair Work Ombudsman — record-keeping · ATO — what payments are qualifying earnings