Locum and agency
Locum and agency
Locum and agency work as an employee or on an ABN.
You are paid either as an employee through payroll or as a contractor invoicing on an ABN. Your contract and how the work is done decide which, not what it is called.
Employee or contractor
Locums, agency nurses and contract doctors
- For tax and super, the ATO reads your contract: whether you serve in their business, who controls the work, whether you can send someone else, whether you are paid for a result and whose equipment and risk it is.
- Since 26 August 2024, your workplace rights depend on the whole relationship, including how it works in practice. A contractor earning over $190,100 a year can opt out of that test in writing.
- A contractor earning under that can ask the Fair Work Commission to change unfair contract terms.
- The Nurses Award covers agencies that place nurses. A casual under it is paid a 25% loading instead of leave.
Source: ATO, TR 2023/4 (December 2023); Fair Work Ombudsman and Fair Work Commission, September 2026; Nurses Award 2020.
An ABN rate against a payroll rate
Before you quote or accept a rate
An ABN rate is paid only for the weeks you work. A payroll rate also pays your leave. This puts the two side by side.
Fill in your details above to see your result.
Arithmetic only. An employee is paid for 52 weeks, with super on top. A contractor also pays their own indemnity, income protection and accountant. Source: ATO; Fair Work Ombudsman.
Tax on an ABN
Sole traders, and doctors with a company or trust
- Income mainly from your own skills is taxed as yours, even through a company or trust, unless you run a personal services business. With 80% or more from one hospital, practice or agency, only the results test counts.
- A medical service to a patient is GST-free. A doctor’s service to a clinic is not, unless a Medicare benefit is payable for it. GST registration is due within 21 days of reaching $75,000 of turnover.
- Tax instalments start automatically once your last return showed $4,000 of business income and $1,000 of tax.
- Keep invoices, timesheets and a car logbook for 5 years after you lodge.
Source: ATO, personal services income, GST and health (June 2024), PAYG instalments and records, September 2026.
Payroll tax and agency rules
Contractor GPs and agency nurses
- Since a 2023 court ruling, a medical centre’s payments to contractor GPs can count as wages for payroll tax. NSW rebates it for practices that bulk bill at least 80% in Sydney or 70% elsewhere; Victoria exempts bulk-billed work from 1 July 2025; Queensland exempts GP wages from 1 December 2024; South Australia exempts bulk-billed work from 1 July 2024.
- NSW public hospitals use agency nurses only once every other option is exhausted, from a state panel, at the award rate through NSW Health payroll, and with no bonuses.
Source: Thomas and Naaz v Chief Commissioner [2023] NSWCA 40; Revenue NSW, State Revenue Office Victoria, Queensland Revenue Office, RevenueSA; NSW Health PD2025_007 (February 2025).
What to know
What we do
- Keep your invoices, and match the super each payer owes
What we don’t
- Say whether to work on an ABN. Your accountant does that