Structured Workplace Learning

Payment and taxation

The minimum rate of payment for students undertaking structured workplace learning in Victoria is $5 per day, except:

• if the structured workplace learning placement is with a Commonwealth department or a body established under a Commonwealth Act, no payment will be made. If the student or the parent/carer is not prepared to accept this condition, then it is their choice not to proceed with a Commonwealth placement. On the Structured Workplace Learning arrangement form, the line 'Rate of payment' should be completed with the words 'Commonwealth establishment – exempt from paying'
• if the structured workplace learning placement is with an organisation that is engaged wholly or mainly in an educational, charitable or community welfare service not conducted for profit, the student may determine that the whole of his or her payment will be donated back to that organisation. If the student determines that the whole of his or her payment will be donated back to that organisation, the parent/carer (where the student is under 18 years of age) must provide written consent to the proposed donation.

Payment does not include payment in kind. Gift cards and vouchers which would restrict a student to purchasing goods and services from a single pre-determined outlet or business must not be used to pay students.

Students aged 18 years and over will be required to provide a Tax File Number declaration to the employer. The employer will be required to withhold amounts in accordance with the tax tables (where applicable), issue payment summaries and report these payments to the Australian Taxation Office (ATO), as they would do for their employees.

Where the student is under 18 years of age, if the payment made to the student is $356 or less per week, the employer will not be obliged to:

• make any withholding
• collect tax file number declarations
• issue payment summaries
• report payment details to the ATO.