One of many nation’s greatest office relations advisory companies has been slapped with a $3m penalty for pretending to be affiliated with a authorities company.
Employsure Pty Ltd was fined for making false and deceptive representations in its on-line advertisements which misled prospects into considering it was or was related to the Honest Work Ombudsman or Honest Work Fee over a two 12 months interval.
The Full Federal Courtroom upheld the Australian Competitors and Shopper Fee’s penalty enchantment towards Employsure earlier this month.
The court docket tripled the penalty initially imposed by Federal Courtroom after ruling $1m wasn’t sufficient to sufficiently deter different companies from comparable future conduct.
Welcoming the upper penalty, ACCC chair Gina Cass-Gottlieb stated the corporate’s “dimension and prolonged interval throughout which they ran the deceptive advertisements” warranted the rise.
“We acquired greater than 100 complaints about Employsure’s conduct,” she stated in a press release.
“We had been involved that many small enterprise operators had been misled by Employsure’s advertisements into considering they had been getting assist and recommendation from a authorities company.
“Penalties have to be sufficiently excessive to discourage others, in order that they can’t be seen as simply an appropriate ‘price of doing enterprise’.
“This determination ought to function a reminder that it’s a critical breach of belief to misrepresent a enterprise as being a part of the federal government, and that such breaches of the regulation may have critical penalties.”
Employsure’s advertisements appeared in Google search outcomes between August 2016 and August 2018, when shoppers looked for “honest work ombudsman”, “honest work fee” and different related phrases.
The advertisements featured headlines together with “Honest Work Ombudsman Assist – Free 24/7 Employer Recommendation” and “Honest Work Fee Recommendation – Free Employer Recommendation”.
The buyer watchdog launched authorized proceedings towards Employsure in December 2018, alleging the corporate misled shoppers with these advertisements.
The Federal Courtroom dismissed the ACCC’s case in October 2020, earlier than the Full Federal Courtroom unanimously upheld the buyer watchdog’s enchantment in August the next 12 months.
The unique Federal Courtroom decide imposed a $1m tremendous on Employsure for its conduct in November 2021, prompting the ACCC to enchantment the penalty determination in January final 12 months.
Initially revealed as Employsure’s fine for ‘misleading’ Google ads tripled to $3m
