Rising fill rates suggest 'modest easing in recruitment difficulty'
Filling vacancies became "slightly easier" for Australian employers in the first quarter of 2025 than in late last year, according to a new report.
The country's vacancy fill rate went up to 69.7% in the March quarter, an increase of 1.1 percentage points from 68.6% in the December quarter of 2024.
The fill rate refers to the percentage of vacancies employers advertised that were filled, with the increase suggesting a "modest easing in recruitment difficulty."
"Australia's job market suggests employers are finding it slightly easier to fill roles than late last year," said Jobs and Skills Australia (JSA) in a statement.
The increase in the first quarter continues the upward trend in fill rates in Australia, with the current data significantly higher than the 60.2% rate in the March quarter of 2023.
According to the data, fill rates in the Metro and Regional areas also went up, but fill rates in the Metro outpaced the regional, with a 71.6% fill rate compared to 64.3% outside capital cities.
By skill level, the fill rate for skill levels 1, 3, and 4 improved in the March quarter.
"The fill rate for Skill Level 2 occupations, while higher than 12 months ago, declined slightly by 0.7 percentage points over the quarter," the report read.
The biggest challenge to hire was also reported in Skill Level 3, where the fill rates remained behind at 55.5% despite a slight improvement from the previous quarter.
According to the JSA, these are jobs with VET qualifications as the main pathway to the labour market.
Meanwhile, the report also found that some occupations in Australia remain "undersupplied," with their average applicants per vacancy below the national average. Among these roles are audiologists, psychiatrists, podiatrists, occupational therapists, and veterinarians.
On the other hand, oversupplied occupations, or those with higher-than-average applicants per vacancy, were recorded in the country's ICT and management fields.
These findings were recorded in the Labour Supply Index, a newly introduced metric that shows the supply pipeline across different job groups in the country.
