A 24 hour care shift is a shift where a home care employee is required to be available for duty in a client’s home for a 24 hour period. It's different to a sleepover.
Employees will work and sleep at the client’s home during the shift.
There are different rules applying to 24 hour care shifts from 1 July 2022.
After 1 July 2022
From 1 July 2022, employers are only able to roster employees to work a 24 hour care shift by agreement.
Payment
Employees are paid for 8 hours’ work at 155% of their minimum hourly rate during a 24 hour care shift. Casual employees also get their casual loading.
If an employee works for more than 8 hours during the shift, they get paid overtime. The overtime rates are the following percentages of the minimum hourly rate:
- first 2 hours – 150%
- after 2 hours – 200%
- Sundays – 200%
- public holidays – 250%.
Casual employees also get their casual loading. To calculate the overtime rates, use our Pay and Conditions Tool.
Employees are able to refuse to work more than 8 hours during a 24 hour care shift if the requirement to work the additional hours is unreasonable.
Accommodation
Employees will be given the opportunity to sleep for a continuous period of 8 hours during a 24 hour care shift.
Employees are provided with free board and lodging for every night they sleep over, including:
- a separate room with a bed and clean linen
- the use of facilities, including access to food preparation facilities and staff facilities where they exist.
Before 1 July 2022
Payment
For each 24 hour care shift, home care employees got paid for 8 hours’ work at 155% of their minimum hourly rate.
Casual employees also got their 25% casual loading. This was calculated on their minimum hourly rate.
Overtime rates didn't apply when an employee worked for more than 8 hours.
Accommodation
Employees normally had the opportunity to sleep during a 24 hour care shift.
Where appropriate, a bed in a private room was provided for the employee.
What to do next
- Use our Pay and Conditions Tool to calculate pay rates, allowances and penalty rates (including overtime).
- Not sure this is your award? Use Find my award to find out which award applies to you.
- Get help with pay.
- Find out about Other workplace relations help