NAB and the Finance Sector Union are at loggerheads over the scope of the bank’s payroll review, which is remediating widespread underpayment, and the issue looks like being determined in court.

NAB issued a statement yesterday, seeking to clarify the scope and progress of its payroll review, following a report in The Australian that the Finance Sector Union is planning court action.

NAB announced the start of its payroll review in December 2019, acknowledging that it had underpaid staff. Since then it has investigated 148 matters, of which 61 have been closed.

Twenty-two of those matters have revealed underpayment and to date NAB has paid out around A$55 million.

NAB said the FSU’s claim that all full-time staff, current and former, are eligible for remediation payments is not correct.

“The issue of hours worked only impacts some current and former colleagues in group 3 and above who worked part-time for all or part of the remediation period.”

The issue relates to the formula used to calculate remuneration for part-time staff, which was different to the method used to calculate remuneration for full-time staff.

The bank said it has identified 3200 current and former staff impacted by the part-time issue.

“We have paid all current colleagues and are now in the process of contacting former colleagues,” it said.

According to the report in The Australian, the FSU claims the underpayment problem also affect full-time staff and its members have asked the union to brief a barrister.