Australian Delivery Drivers Get a Pay Rise Today: The New Rates
- Minimum rates for on-demand delivery workers take effect today, 17 August 2026, under the first minimum standards order the Fair Work Commission has ever issued.
- The rates run from $31.30 an hour on an e-bike to $32.00 in a car, against a national minimum wage of $26.44. Each rises by 50 cents on 1 January 2027.
- They apply to engaged time — the period between accepting a job and completing it. Waiting for the next order is not paid; waiting at the restaurant after accepting one is.
- It is not checked delivery by delivery. Platforms average earnings over 21 days and must top up anyone who falls below the floor.
- The order is interim, and the Commission hears the connected ’last mile’ cases on 25 and 26 August. If it moves on those, it has said it will review this order.
Minimum pay rates for gig delivery riders start in Australia today — from $31.30 an hour, against a national minimum wage of $26.44.
The detail that decides what it is worth: the rate applies to engaged time, not to time spent logged in and waiting.
What are the new rates?
| Vehicle | 2026 | 2027 |
|---|---|---|
| E-bike | $31.30 | $31.80 |
| Motorcycle | $31.80 | $32.30 |
| Car | $32.00 | $32.50 |
All figures are Australian dollars per hour. The 2026 column runs from 17 August to 31 December; the 2027 column applies from 1 January and is each 2026 rate plus the 50-cent rise the Commission has set.
For comparison, the national minimum wage is $26.44 an hour — so the floor for a rider on an e-bike sits about 18 per cent above it.
What does “engaged time” actually mean?
This is the part that changes the arithmetic.
Engaged time is the period between accepting a job and completing it. Within that window the minimum applies. Outside it, generally, it does not.
| Situation | Paid? |
|---|---|
| Riding to collect an order | Yes |
| Waiting at the restaurant, after accepting | Yes |
| Riding to the customer | Yes |
| Logged in, waiting for an offer | No |
So a rider who spends an hour logged in and forty minutes of it on jobs is not guaranteed $31.30 for the hour. They are guaranteed the rate for the forty minutes.
That is a genuine floor where none existed, and it is also why the headline number and a wage are different things.
It is averaged over three weeks, not checked per job
Platforms work out total earnings across a 21-day period and must top a worker up if the average comes in under the floor.
That cuts both ways. A quiet run of shifts does not automatically produce a shortfall payment, because a busy stretch in the same window can carry it. Equally, a rider does not lose the protection because one delivery ran long.
Who is covered, and who is not
The order covers employee-like workers engaged through a digital labour platform to mainly pick up food, drinks, alcohol or groceries from a business and deliver them to a customer as soon as possible. It covers the platform operators too.
It does not cover workers using a vehicle with a carrying capacity of more than one tonne — that is the line the Commission drew, and it is what keeps this order to on-demand delivery rather than freight.
Around 250,000 workers are affected, on reported estimates. Uber Eats and DoorDash are among the platforms.
Pay is not the only thing in the order
The rates have taken the headlines, but the order runs to eleven categories of terms:
| Term | |
|---|---|
| Minimum pay rates | Record-keeping |
| Gig worker information statement | Fines and insurance |
| Vehicle repairs and expenses | Consultation on big changes |
| Platform feedback forum | Right to unpaid time away |
| Workplace delegates rights | Dispute resolution |
| Information to workers |
On insurance, the split matters. Riders still carry their own vehicle costs. What is new is that platforms must arrange and pay for personal accident cover at what the order calls a reasonable minimum level.
The consultation term is the quiet one. Platforms now have to consult workers about significant changes — including leaving the market.
This is an interim order, and there is a hearing next week
The word in the title is doing work: Interim.
The Transport Workers’ Union brought three applications. This one, on-demand delivery, is decided. The other two — covering ’last mile’ delivery, both employee-like workers and road transport contractors — are still running, and the Commission hears them on 25 and 26 August on whether to issue notices of intent.
The Ombudsman has said plainly that if the Commission issues a notice of intent and a draft order on either of those, it will review this order. So today’s rates are a floor with a review already scheduled into the process.
What the people involved said
| Who | On |
|---|---|
| Michael Kaine, TWU secretary | “History in the making” |
| Ed Kitchen, Uber Eats MD | A “guaranteed safety net” |
| Dr Alex Veen, Univ. of Sydney | Cooperation and negotiation |
Kaine, whose union brought the case, called it “history in the making really, not just in Australia, but right around the world.” Kitchen, for a platform the order binds, framed it as standards that “provide a guaranteed safety net while protecting the flexibility delivery people tell us they value most.”
Both have a stake in how this is read. The academic view, from Dr Veen at the University of Sydney, was that “it’s very pleasing to see that it’s gone through a process of cooperation and negotiation” — a comment about process rather than outcome.
What to watch
- Check whether your hours are engaged hours. The floor applies between accepting and completing, and that is the number that decides your pay.
- The top-up lands on a 21-day cycle, not per shift, so judge it over a period rather than a night.
- One tonne is the boundary. Above that carrying capacity, this order does not apply to you.
- Watch 25 and 26 August. The last-mile hearings are what could reopen these rates.
- Insurance is now the platform’s bill, but only for personal accident cover. Vehicle costs have not moved.
Sources
| Source | What it supports here |
|---|---|
| Fair Work Commission: TWU minimum standards applications (MS2024/1-3) | The order’s full name, that an Expert Panel made it on 11 August 2026, the 17 August start, decision [2026] FWCFB 211, and the 25–26 August hearing on the last-mile cases |
| Fair Work Ombudsman: new minimum standards for on-demand delivery workers | Who the order covers and excludes, the eleven categories of terms, that it is the Commission’s first such order, and that the order will be reviewed if the last-mile cases advance |
| ABC News: what is changing about how food delivery workers are paid | The three rate tiers, the engaged-time definition, the 21-day averaging, the insurance split and every quote |
| Fair Work Commission: minimum standards order and decision made | Independent confirmation of the 17 August commencement |
Checked 17 August 2026. No affiliate links, and no payment was received for any link on this page.
How we verified this
The order, its date and its scope come from the Fair Work Commission and the Fair Work Ombudsman directly. The Commission’s case page records that an Expert Panel for the road transport industry made the Interim On-Demand Delivery Employee-like Worker Minimum Standards Order on 11 August 2026, operating from 17 August, in case MS2024/3, with the decision published as [2026] FWCFB 211. The Ombudsman’s guidance, published 13 August, describes it as “the first minimum standards order that the Commission has issued” — that wording is theirs.
The rate tiers are reported by the ABC and are not, at the time of writing, on either regulator’s public page. The Ombudsman’s page lists the terms the order contains but states that fuller information is still to come, and the Commission’s fact sheet is a PDF we could not read. The three-tier breakdown — e-bike, motorcycle, car — is the ABC’s. The overall range of $31.30 to $32.00 for 2026, and the 50-cent increase from 1 January 2027, are corroborated across several other outlets. Where this page gives a 2027 figure per vehicle it is the 2026 rate plus the stated 50 cents, which is arithmetic rather than a published table.
The engaged-time definition and the 21-day averaging are the load-bearing details and are attributed. Both come from the ABC’s explainer. They matter more than the headline rate, because a rate that applies only between accepting and completing a job is not the same thing as an hourly wage, and a floor tested over three weeks is not the same as a floor tested per shift.
Two of the three official sources pass a control check; the third was read directly instead. The Commission’s case page returns a live page for the real case and 404 for an invented one, and the ABC behaves the same way. The Ombudsman’s host did not respond to an automated request at all, for a real URL or an invented one, so its page was opened and read in a browser rather than treated as verified by status.
The exclusion is quoted from the Ombudsman: the order does not cover workers using a vehicle with a carrying capacity of more than one tonne.
The 250,000 figure is a reported estimate, not a regulator’s count, and is presented as such.
Named quotes are reproduced as the ABC published them, with each speaker’s role given so readers can weigh the source. The Transport Workers’ Union brought the application, and Uber Eats is a covered platform; both have an interest, which is why both are labelled rather than quoted neutrally.
We do not say what this does to prices, delivery times or platform behaviour. None of that has happened yet. The order came into force on the day this was written.