A short permanent stint looked like a dead end - until the Commission looked at 16 months of casual work
Can years of casual shifts count when a worker fights an unfair dismissal? The Fair Work Commission says yes.
In a decision dated June 19, 2026, the Commission knocked back a small business employer's attempt to shut down an unfair dismissal claim before it could be heard. The argument turned on a technical but high-stakes question for HR: how casual service is counted toward the minimum employment period.
The worker joined Tegrity Services Pty Ltd as a casual in October 2023, hired as a "Support Worker & Business Administration." He moved to permanent part-time as an "Operations Manager" in February 2025, then was dismissed that September. Looked at alone, his permanent service fell short of the one-year minimum that staff at small businesses must clear to be protected from unfair dismissal.
The employer raised a jurisdictional objection - a threshold argument that the worker wasn't eligible to bring a claim at all. The permanent stint was too short, it said, and the earlier casual period shouldn't count.
This is where HR should pay attention. Under the Fair Work Act, casual service can count toward the minimum employment period, but only on two conditions. The work has to be that of a "regular casual employee," and the worker must have had a reasonable expectation of continuing employment on a regular and systematic basis.
The employer accepted the first condition. The whole case came down to the second.
The company director who appeared argued the worker had previously turned down a permanent offer, citing a July 2024 email and the worker's outside commitments - university study and a tutoring job. The suggestion was that someone with that much on his plate couldn't have genuinely expected steady, ongoing work.
The Commissioner disagreed. After hearing both men give evidence, the Commissioner preferred the worker's version, finding the two had talked about his future at the company throughout his time there. The Commissioner also found the July email never actually named the role on offer, so it couldn't show the worker had rejected the same job he later accepted permanently.
The payroll records settled the rest. Across about 16 months of casual work, the worker's hours bounced around from one fortnight to the next, but he turned up consistently. That frequency and volume, the Commission found, showed a repetitive pattern and a steady reliance on his work - enough to make the casual employment regular and systematic.
The Commission was also satisfied the worker truly expected to keep working on that basis, and that the expectation was reasonable. A second job or university study, the Commissioner said, doesn't cancel out an expectation of ongoing work. The continuing conversations about his future - which ended with his conversion to permanent - only strengthened the point.
With both tests cleared, the casual service counted. The worker met the minimum employment period and was found to be protected from unfair dismissal. The objection was dismissed, and the unfair dismissal claim now moves to a case management conference.
For HR teams, the lesson is concrete. The eligibility clock doesn't always start the day a casual goes permanent. Where casual work was regular and systematic, and the records back it up, that time can count toward the minimum employment period. A vague offer email won't prove a worker said no to permanency. And outside commitments, on their own, won't sink a reasonable expectation of ongoing work.
The ruling decides only the threshold question. The Commission has not yet decided whether the dismissal itself was unfair.
