Client Cancelled the Shift — Does the Worker Still Get Paid?

Clause 25.5(f) of the SCHADS Award (MA000100) applies where a client cancels a scheduled home care or disability service within 7 days of the scheduled service, which a full-time or part-time employee was rostered to provide. Rescheduling counts as a cancellation for this purpose.

• Full-time and part-time employees: the shift cannot simply vanish. The employer must either redeploy the worker to other work, pay the shift out, or provide make-up time.
• Make-up time requires at least 12 hours' notice. If the worker was told with less than 12 hours' notice, the make-up option is not available — the employer must pay clause 25.5(f)(iv)(A).
• Casual employees are not covered by clause 25.5(f). The clause is expressly limited to full-time and part-time employees. A casual whose shift is cancelled has no award entitlement to cancellation pay.

The rest of this guide walks through each branch. For the reference version with the clause text, see our SCHADS client cancellation pay resource.

When a client cancels inside the 7-day window, clause 25.5(f)(ii) gives the employer exactly two choices:

• Branch A — direct the employee to perform other work during the hours they were rostered (clause 25.5(f)(ii)(A)).
• Branch B — cancel the rostered shift, or the affected part of it (clause 25.5(f)(ii)(B)).

These are not equivalent, and each carries its own payment rule.

If the employer picks Branch A, the worker is paid the greater of what they would have received for the cancelled service, or what the work actually performed is worth (clause 25.5(f)(iii)). This is the answer to a question we see constantly: "the client cancelled, can my employer make me do admin work instead?" Yes — that is an express option in the award. But it cannot be used to pay you less. If the cancelled service would have attracted a Saturday penalty and the replacement admin work would not, you are still paid the higher of the two.

If the employer picks Branch B, clause 25.5(f)(iv) requires them to either pay the employee the amount they would have received had the shift not been cancelled, or provide make-up time — and make-up time is heavily conditioned.

This is the provision most providers miss. Clause 25.5(f)(v) states that the make-up time arrangement can only be used where the employee was notified at least 12 hours before the scheduled start of the cancelled service. If less than 12 hours' notice is given, clause 25.5(f)(iv)(A) applies — the employer must pay the shift.

So the practical test for a full-time or part-time worker is a single question: how much notice did I get?

• 12 hours' notice or more → the employer may offer make-up time instead of paying, subject to the conditions below.
• Less than 12 hours' notice → make-up time is not available. The shift is paid.

A cancellation "within 24 hours" — the wording people usually use — therefore does not resolve the question by itself. A cancellation at 20 hours' notice permits make-up time; a cancellation at 6 hours' notice does not. The line sits at 12 hours, not 24.

Where the employer does elect make-up time, clause 25.5(f)(vi) attaches five conditions. All of them apply:

• 7 days' notice of the make-up time must be given to the employee (or a shorter period by agreement with them).
• Within 6 weeks — the make-up time must be worked within 6 weeks of the date of the cancelled service. It cannot be banked indefinitely.
• Consultation — the employer must consult the employee under clause 8A (consultation about changes to rosters or hours of work) about when the make-up time is worked.
• Other clients or other areas are allowed — the make-up time can be with different clients or in another part of the business, provided the employee has the skill and competence for the work.
• Paid at the greater amount — an employee working make-up time is paid the amount payable had they performed the cancelled service, or the amount for the work actually performed, whichever is greater.

Miss the 6-week window or skip the consultation and the make-up election is not properly made — which puts you back at the pay obligation.

Clause 25.5(f)(i) is explicit: it applies to a service "which a full-time or part-time employee was rostered to provide." Casual employees are not within its scope.

That means the SCHADS Award gives a casual no entitlement to cancellation pay when a client cancels. This is the flip side of casual employment: the casual loading in clause 10.4 is paid instead of the entitlements casuals are excluded from, and roster certainty is one of them.

Two important qualifications, because this is where providers get it wrong in the other direction:

• If the casual actually works, minimum payments apply. Under clause 10.5, part-time and casual employees are paid for a minimum number of hours for each shift or period of work: 3 hours for social and community services employees (except when undertaking disability services work) and 2 hours for all other employees. A casual who turns up, is not told, and is sent home has an argument they were engaged — and the minimum payment attaches. See our minimum engagement reference.
• Your enterprise agreement or contract may be more generous. The award is a floor, not a ceiling. Many providers pay casuals for short-notice cancellations as a retention measure. That is a policy commitment, and once it is in a contract or agreement it is enforceable — check what you have actually promised before telling a worker the award says no.

Clause 25.5(f)(iv) sets out a closed list of options where a shift is cancelled: pay it, or provide make-up time. Some things we regularly see that are not on that list:

• Deducting annual leave to cover the cancelled hours. This is a frequent question from part-time workers and it is not one of the award's options. Annual leave is taken by agreement under the NES; a client cancellation does not convert rostered hours into leave.
• Treating it as unpaid, silently. For a full-time or part-time worker inside the 7-day window, doing nothing is not an option — the default is payment.
• Using make-up time on short notice. Under 12 hours, it is off the table (clause 25.5(f)(v)).
• Confusing a cancellation with a roster change. These are separate mechanisms. A roster change requires 7 days' notice under clause 25.5(d)(i), and can only be made at shorter notice for an agreed shift swap, or to cover another employee's illness or an emergency (clause 25.5(d)(ii)). Clause 25.5(f)(vii) confirms the cancellation rules operate alongside the roster rules — an employer cannot relabel a cancellation as a roster change to avoid paying.

Example 1 — part-time, 6 hours' notice. A part-time support worker is rostered 9am–3pm Thursday. The client cancels at 3am Thursday. That is under 12 hours, so make-up time is unavailable. The employer either directs other work for those hours (paid at the greater amount) or pays the 6 hours out. Nothing else is compliant.

Example 2 — part-time, 3 days' notice. Same shift, cancelled Monday. That is inside the 7-day window and above the 12-hour threshold, so make-up time is available — provided the employer gives 7 days' notice of the make-up shift, schedules it within 6 weeks, and consults the worker under clause 8A.

Example 3 — casual, 30 minutes' notice. A casual is rostered 5pm–9pm and told at 4:30pm the client has cancelled. Clause 25.5(f) does not apply to casuals, so the award provides no cancellation payment. If the worker had already commenced or was engaged, the clause 10.5 minimum payment becomes the live question instead.

Example 4 — cancelled 10 days out. Clause 25.5(f) only bites inside 7 days of the scheduled service. A cancellation 10 days ahead falls outside it, and the ordinary roster-change rules in clause 25.5(d) govern instead.

Cancellation errors are hard to spot after the fact because the evidence is an absence — a shift that was rostered and then is not in the pay run. The three things worth capturing at the moment of cancellation:

• The timestamp of the notification to the employee, not the time the client rang. The 12-hour test runs off when the employee was notified.
• Which branch you elected — other work, payment, or make-up time — and for make-up time, the date it was worked, so the 6-week window is auditable.
• The value of the cancelled service, so the "greater of" comparison in clauses 25.5(f)(iii) and (vi)(E) can actually be performed. Without the original shift's penalty loadings, you cannot show the worker was paid the higher amount.

CrossVault's Timesheet Validator reads rostered-versus-worked data and flags shifts that disappeared from the pay run without a corresponding payment or make-up entry, alongside every other SCHADS check.

If you are permanent or part-time and a client cancelled on you inside a week, the hours should show up somewhere — as pay for the cancelled shift, as pay for replacement work at no less than the original value, or as a make-up shift within 6 weeks. If the hours simply vanished and you had less than 12 hours' notice, that is a gap worth raising. Upload a payslip to our free payslip check and it will verify your rates and allowances against the current SCHADS minimums, line by line.