What’s a broken shift?

It’s a shift that’s made up of two work periods. These work periods need to be:

• worked on the same day within a maximum spread of 13 hours
• separated by a break that is more than an hour long.

Do employees get an allowance for working a broken shift?

Yes. To find out the amount of the allowance, use our Pay and Conditions Tool.

How do broken shifts interact with shift penalty rates?

If a shift penalty rate applies to any part of the broken shift, employees get paid that penalty rate on all the ordinary hours that they work in the broken shift.

This is because the work periods in a broken shift count as one shift.

These penalty rates are paid as well as the broken shift allowance.

Give us feedback on this article

Use our Feedback form to give us feedback about the information in this article.

If you have a question about pay or entitlements or need our help with a workplace issue, you can submit an online enquiry.