The employer argued liability "should never have been accepted" - a judge disagreed
A postal worker hurt his back lifting a parcel. His employer accepted the workers' compensation claim, then tried to undo it. Two tribunals and a Federal Court judge later, the employer is still on the hook.
The Federal Court of Australia on November 9, 2026, dismissed all four grounds of appeal brought by Australia Post against a Tribunal decision that found the national postal service remained liable for a mail sorter's workplace back injury.
The worker had been employed by Australia Post since December 2019, first as a postal delivery officer in Melbourne's south-east, then redeployed as a mail sorter at the Dandenong South Parcel Delivery Centre in October 2020. On January 4, 2021, he hurt his back while lifting a parcel during his shift.
Australia Post moved quickly. Within weeks it accepted liability under the Safety, Rehabilitation and Compensation Act 1988 (SRC Act) for what it classified as a "mechanical lower back strain." Over the following months it approved a series of physiotherapy treatments and incapacity payments.
Then came the reversal.
In April 2022, Australia Post determined the worker had no present entitlement to compensation for medical expenses or lost work capacity from that date onward. That decision was affirmed on internal review in June 2022. The worker took the matter to the Administrative Appeals Tribunal.
What followed was a three-day hearing in July 2024 in which Australia Post did not simply argue the worker had recovered. It went further, contending he had "never suffered from a compensable injury" and that "liability should never have been accepted under section 14" of the SRC Act. In other words, the employer tried to unwind the very acceptance it had made back in January 2021.
Australia Post's case rested heavily on medical evidence that the worker had pre-existing degenerative disc disease. Its position: the degenerative condition - not the workplace incident - explained his ongoing symptoms, and any work-related aggravation had long since resolved.
The Tribunal heard from three neurosurgeons, along with extensive records from GPs, radiologists, a chiropractor, a physiotherapist, and a pain management physician. It found the worker had suffered an injury - a mechanical lower back strain - arising in the course of his employment on January 4, 2021. It preferred the evidence of one neurosurgeon who characterised the injury as a disc tear, finding that another expert's view attributing the condition to genetics alone was "an oversimplification of a complex condition."
The Tribunal accepted Australia Post remained liable under the SRC Act. But rather than calculating exactly what the worker was owed in medical expenses and lost wages, it sent those questions back to Australia Post to work out - noting that while the evidence indicated the worker had capacity to return to his pre-injury duties, it did not have enough information about his actual pre-injury working hours, overtime, or the specifics of treatment obtained after April 2022 to do the maths itself.
That decision to send the compensation questions back became the centrepiece of the appeal.
Australia Post framed its appeal around four questions of law. First, it argued that sending the compensation question back to the employer was "legally unreasonable or irrational" - if the Tribunal itself noted the worker could return to his pre-injury duties, why was there anything left to assess?
The court drew a distinction. Being physically able to perform specified lifting tasks was not the same thing as being able to work at the same level as before the injury - including the same hours, overtime, and full range of duties. Reading the Tribunal's observation as a final determination that the worker had no incapacity at all "would make the paragraph internally contradictory, when a more coherent construction is available on a fair reading of the reasons."
Second, Australia Post argued the Tribunal failed to do its job by not fully deciding whether the worker was still entitled to compensation for medical expenses and lost work capacity. The court noted the irony: it was Australia Post itself that had steered the Tribunal toward the threshold question of whether a compensable injury existed at all. The Tribunal resolved that dispute, made findings as far as the evidence allowed, and sent the rest back. That was within its power.
Third, Australia Post said the Tribunal ignored its backup argument - that the effects of the injury had ceased by April 2022 regardless. The court found the Tribunal was "patently aware" of that argument but the decision to send the matter back was itself a response to it, not a failure to address it.
Fourth, Australia Post complained the Tribunal gave inadequate reasons for sending the compensation questions back. The court held that while the Tribunal could have been more explicit, the basis was "apparent when the reasons are read as a whole and fairly." The evidence simply did not allow the Tribunal to determine the worker's pre-injury working level, which periods he may have been unable to work at that level, or the compensation owed.
Australia Post was ordered to pay the worker's costs of the appeal.
For HR teams managing workers' compensation claims, the case is a practical reminder: once liability is accepted, trying to reverse that acceptance years later - particularly on the basis it should "never have been accepted" - is an uphill fight, and the employer may end up footing the legal bill twice over.
