Parties involved in an investigation can request a review for any, some, or all of these reasons:
- they’re unhappy with the Fair Work Inspector’s behaviour
- they believe the process was unsatisfactory
- they don’t agree with the outcome.
You can request a review during or after an investigation over the phone, via our website, through email, or by writing to us.
Complaints about Fair Work Inspectors
We are government employees and must follow the Australian Public Service Code of Conduct.
APS Code of Conduct - the details
If you think a Fair Work Inspector has behaved unprofessionally, you can ask us to review their conduct.
You can do this with the Fair Work Inspector or with their manager. If the manager can’t resolve your complaint, they will ask the relevant state director to review it.
Outcome reviews & how to get them
If you don’t agree with the outcome of an investigation, you can lodge a file review request with the Fair Work Inspector or their manager.
We’re committed to ensuring reviews remain impartial and transparent. For this to happen, reviews may go through up to 3-tiers of our review process:
- conducting a process review (we do this to check whether the original Fair Work Inspector followed our investigation process)
- redoing the investigation (this is done by our specialist File Review Team)
- referring the person who made the complaint to the Commonwealth Ombudsman.
After the review
After the review finishes, the reviewer reports the findings. Sometimes, they contact you and sometimes the state director contacts you.
The possible findings of the review include:
- the reviewer supports and upholds the investigation process and outcome
- the reviewer supports and upholds the process, but not the outcome
- the reviewer overturns the investigation and outcome.