Pharmacy Award Pay Rates 2026-27

Pharmacy award pay rates 2026-27 by classification

The award sets a weekly rate for 38 ordinary hours and an hourly rate for each of its 14 classifications. Part-timers get the hourly rate for their hours. The last two columns show what a full-time week leaves after the ATO weekly tax table. Pharmacy students are paid the same as the assistant level with the same number: a first-year student matches level 1.

Pharmacist award rates and the 14.1% increase

Pharmacist and intern rates moved twice at the start of 2026-27. The Fair Work Commission's gender undervaluation review found these classifications underpaid by 14.1% and phases the correction in over three stages, on 30 June 2025, 30 June 2026, 30 June 2027. Determination PR810422 set the stage 2 rates from the first full pay period starting on or after 30 June 2026; the 4.75% Annual Wage Review increase then applied on top from the first full pay period starting on or after 1 July 2026. Pharmacy assistants and students are not part of this review and received the 4.75% increase only.

The third stage applies from the first full pay period starting on or after 30 June 2027. The Commission has not yet published those rates, so this page will add them when it does. If your pay period started on 30 June 2026, you were owed the 30 June 2026 column for that period and the 1 July 2026 rate from the next one.

Meal breaks taken on the premises

A pharmacist who has to take a meal break on the premises to deal with urgent matters is paid 150% of their minimum hourly rate for the break, whatever other penalty applies. Fair Work's pay guide lists the casual figure at 175%, the 25% loading included.

How much tax comes out of pharmacy pay

Your employer withholds tax each pay using the ATO's Schedule 1 tables. On a full-time level 1 assistant week of $1,056.80 that is $156 with the tax-free threshold claimed. The threshold can only be claimed with one employer, so a second pharmacy job is withheld at the no-threshold rate: $267 on the same week, leaving $789.80. The second job tax calculator works through any pair of jobs.

Many pharmacists carry a HELP debt from their degree. With a study loan flagged, the withholding on a $1,586.30 pharmacist week rises from $326 to $364. The HECS repayment calculator shows what that comes to over a year.

Weekly withholding runs a little ahead of the real annual bill at these pay levels. A full-time level 1 year of $54,953.60 costs $7,929.46 in tax and Medicare levy, while 52 weeks of withholding comes to $8,112, so $183 comes back at tax time. The gap is wider for part-timers and casuals: a casual working 20 weekday hours every week at level 1 has $3,328 withheld over the year against $2,715.57 of actual tax, about $612 back. The tax refund calculator works out your own figure.

Employer super sits on top: 12% of ordinary earnings, or $6,594.43 a year at full-time level 1 and $9,898.51 for a pharmacist. For any other salary, the PAYG calculator gives the same annual breakdown.

Casual pharmacy assistant and pharmacist rates 2026-27

Casuals get a 25% loading on the minimum hourly rate for ordinary hours, and the award states the casual evening, weekend and holiday rates as all-in percentages: 150% for 7pm to 9pm on a weekday and Saturday daytime, 175% for Sunday daytime and 250% for a public holiday. Do not add the loading on top of them. Casual students are paid as the assistant level with the same number.

Casual rates at the less common times:

What three common casual weeks leave after tax. The second-job columns apply when you have claimed the tax-free threshold with another employer.

Evening, weekend and public holiday rates

Ordinary hours can be worked any day between 7am and midnight, and the penalty depends on the time of day as well as the day. For full-time and part-time staff: Monday to Friday 7am to 8am is 150%, 8am to 7pm is the ordinary rate, 7pm to 9pm is 125% and 9pm to midnight 150%.

On Saturday it is 200% from 7am to 8am, 125% from 8am to 6pm, 150% from 6pm to 9pm and 175% from 9pm to midnight. Sunday is 150% from 7am to 9pm and 200% outside those hours. A public holiday is 225% all day.

If this is a second job, $173 is withheld instead and $591.82 lands. To check each line on a real payslip, the payslip generator lays out the rates the way an employer must.

A full-time or part-time employee's annual leave loading is 17.5% or the weekend penalties they would have earned, whichever is greater. The annual leave loading guide covers how that works.

Pharmacy Award overtime rates

Overtime is time worked at the employer's direction beyond 38 hours a week (or 76 over two weeks), beyond 12 hours in a day, between midnight and 7am, or outside the agreed roster; for part-timers, beyond their agreed hours. Monday to Saturday it is 150% for the first 2 hours and 200% after that, Sunday 200% and a public holiday 250%. Unlike the Retail Award, the casual loading is not added to overtime, so a casual's overtime rate is the same as a permanent employee's.

Penalty rates are not added on top of overtime rates. By agreement, overtime can be taken as time off at its overtime value (2 hours at time and a half is 3 hours off), within 6 months. The overtime pay calculator handles both.

Which pharmacy classification am I?

Your classification follows the skill your job requires, and your employer must tell you in writing which one you are on. The award's definitions, in short:

A student moves up a rate when all subjects for a year of the course are passed, which can happen in less than a year. A first-year Master of Pharmacy student is paid as a third-year student. Interns move from the first to the second half rate halfway through their training.

Pharmacy assistant junior rates

Only pharmacy assistants at levels 1 and 2 have junior rates. Under 21 they are paid a percentage of the adult rate: 45% under 16, 50% at 16, 60% at 17, 70% at 18, 80% at 19 and 90% at 20. A junior at level 3 or 4, or working as a student or intern, gets the adult rate.

Weekend and evening percentages apply to the junior rate: a 17-year-old casual at level 1 gets $29.21 on a Sunday daytime shift (175% of $16.69).

The junior rate change from 1 December 2026

The Fair Work Commission's junior rates decision (determination PR813656, 26 August 2026) moves assistants aged 18, 19 and 20 who have worked for their employer for more than 6 months to the adult rate in yearly steps. Each step applies from the first full pay period starting on or after the date shown. Under-18s, and 18 to 20 year olds with 6 months or less, keep the current percentages. After the first step the Pharmacy Award moves once a year, each 1 July, where the Retail Award steps every 1 December and 1 July.

The new table applies each percentage to the adult hourly rate. Fair Work has not yet published dollar rates for 1 December 2026, so this page shows the percentages only and will add the dollar figures when the pay guide is issued. Service with a previous owner counts toward the 6 months when the business changed hands.

On the tax side, a short school-age week often has nothing withheld: with the tax-free threshold claimed, withholding is nil up to $364 a week. A 16-year-old casual at level 1 working 15 hours earns $260.85 and has $0 withheld.

Pharmacy Award allowances

The allowances in the 2026-27 pay guide:

Required special clothing is reimbursed at cost, and an employee transferred to another township has the whole cost of moving their household paid. Allowances paid as cash are taxed with your wages; the annual leave payout calculator covers the tax when unused leave is paid out at the end of a job.

Which award covers you: Pharmacy, Retail or Pharmaceutical?

The Pharmacy Industry Award [MA000012] covers community pharmacies: businesses that dispense prescriptions or sell medicines to the public, registered as a pharmacy where the law requires it. It covers everyone in the pharmacy within its classifications, from a level 1 assistant on the front counter to a pharmacist manager, and it applies to the exclusion of any other award. A pharmacy owned by a hospital or other public institution, or run by government, is outside it.

Two names cause confusion. The Pharmaceutical Industry Award [MA000069] is a different award: it covers the manufacture and production of pharmaceuticals, not pharmacies, so its rates do not apply to pharmacy staff. A shop that neither dispenses prescriptions nor sells medicines is not a community pharmacy; for general shops, see the Retail Award pay rates page. If your employer has a registered enterprise agreement, its rates apply instead of the award's.

The award is national, so the same rates apply in New South Wales, Victoria, Queensland, South Australia, Tasmania, the ACT and the Northern Territory. The exception is Western Australia, where a pharmacy run by a sole trader, partnership or other unincorporated business sits in the WA state system rather than under this award.

What changed on 1 July 2026, and what changes next

Frequently asked questions

Sources

• Fair Work Ombudsman: Pay guide, Pharmacy Industry Award 2020 [MA000012] (published 24 June 2026; every rate, junior and allowance figure on this page)
• Fair Work Commission: Pharmacy Industry Award 2020 (coverage 4, part-time 10, casual loading and minimum engagement 11, ordinary hours 13, minimum rates and junior rates 16, allowances 19, overtime 21, penalty rates 22, annual leave loading 23.3, classifications Schedule A, rate summary Schedule B)
• Fair Work Commission: Determination PR810422 (29 May 2026, pharmacist and intern rates from 30 June 2026)
• Fair Work Ombudsman: Changes to the Pharmacy Award (the 14.1% increase in three stages)
• Fair Work Commission: Determination PR813656 (26 August 2026, the junior rate steps from 1 December 2026 to 1 July 2029)
• Fair Work Ombudsman: Pharmaceutical Award [MA000069] (who the different, manufacturing award covers)
• Fair Work Ombudsman: The Fair Work system (who is in the national system, and the Western Australian exception)
• ATO: Schedule 1, statement of formulas for calculating amounts to be withheld (NAT 1004, the withholding figures) and Schedule 8 (NAT 3539, withholding with a study loan)

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