If you employ health professionals, your pay rates are changing on 1 October. Here is what to do now.

If you employ allied health professionals, this one is important. The Fair Work Commission has finalised a new pay and classification structure under the Health Professionals and Support Services Award 2020 (the HPSS Award), and it comes into effect on 1 October 2026.

This is not a minor tweak. It is the culmination of a years-long process finding that health professionals have been systematically underpaid due to gender-based undervaluation of their work. The Commission has now locked in the fix, and employers need to act.

What is actually changing?

The old Level 1 structure for health professionals is being replaced entirely. Instead of pay points based on a generic level system, employees will now be classified and paid based on two things:

• their Australian Qualifications Framework (AQF) level (the qualification required for their profession), and
• their years of experience in the profession.

Pay rates go up, and they go up in a way that reflects each profession’s actual entry-level qualification. A first-year AQF Level 7 health professional (think physiotherapist, occupational therapist, podiatrist) will have a minimum hourly rate of $32.88, rising to $42.44 at seven or more years. At AQF Level 9 (psychologist, audiologist, chiropractor), the range runs from $36.30 to $44.09 per hour.

Increases are being phased in over five years. The first step hits 1 October 2026, with further increases each 30 June from 2027 through to 2030.

The gender pay equity story behind this

This did not happen because the Commission felt like a shake-up. The FWC found that the minimum rates for health professionals had been suppressed for years because of the historically female-dominated nature of the sector. That is gender-based undervaluation in plain English: work done predominantly by women, paid less than comparable work in male-dominated industries.

The Commission also flagged something worth noting for employers: clause 17.1 of the old award, which required part-time and casual employees to accumulate 1824 hours before progressing, has been deleted. The FWC was clear that this clause disproportionately held back female health professionals, the majority of whom work part-time. The new structure means progression is based on years of experience in the profession, regardless of hours.

For employers, the equity dimension is not just moral context. It is a signal that the Commission will scrutinise anything that creates barriers to progression for part-time or female workers in this sector.

The multi-employer bargaining risk you should know about

There is a broader risk for employers in this sector to watch out for. The same unions pushing for these award increases have been actively building the case for sector-wide enterprise bargaining. When minimum award rates rise significantly, it changes the bargaining landscape in two ways.

First, smaller employers who can no longer compete on pay individually may feel pressure to band together, which is exactly what multi-employer bargaining is designed to facilitate. Second, unions can use the award increases as a floor to push for above-award enterprise agreements across the sector, targeting employers whose current agreements are now only marginally above the new award rates.

This does not mean bargaining is inevitable. But if you employ health professionals and you have not thought about where your current rates land relative to the new structure, now is the time to do that work. Knowing your position is the first step to managing it.

What do you actually need to do?

Before 1 October 2026, every employer covered by the HPSS Award should:

• Audit your workforce. Identify every employee covered by the HPSS Award as a health professional and confirm their qualification level (AQF level) and their years of experience in the profession, not just with you.
• Use the translation tables. The determination includes detailed translation tables converting old classifications to the new structure. Use them to confirm where each person lands.
• Check your enterprise agreements. If you have an EA, now is the time to assess whether it still sits above the award after the new rates kick in. If it does not, you have a compliance problem.
• Do not assume overseas qualifications are straightforward. The determination provides some guidance, but overseas-qualified practitioners need to be assessed on a case-by-case basis.
• Remember: experience travels. A new hire with six years of experience in their profession does not start at year one under the new structure. Make sure your payroll reflects that.

One more thing: the Annual Wage Review

The Commission confirmed that the Annual Wage Review increases will not absorb the new rates. These are separate and additional increases. The gender-based undervaluation correction sits on top of whatever the AWR delivers each year, so budget accordingly.

Not sure where your business stands?

We work with a lot of businesses in the health sector and we are already helping clients map their workforce to the new structure. If you want a hand getting ahead of October, get in touch with the team at HR Gurus.