- Call us: 1800 565 975
- info@fairworkplacesolutions.com.au
- 308/20A Lexington Dr, Bella Vista NSW 2153
A consultation, letter of advice, tailored compliance plan and WHS handbook — everything your business needs to meet its obligations under the WHS Act.
As a Person Conducting a Business or Undertaking (PCBU), you have a primary duty of care under the Work Health and Safety (WHS) Act to protect the health and safety of your workers. That obligation sits with you — not your accountant, not your HR adviser, and not a generic template you downloaded from the internet.
If you’re not sure whether your business is meeting its WHS obligations, or you know it isn’t and need help fixing it, our employment lawyers can get you compliant.
We provide a complete WHS compliance service that includes a one-on-one consultation to assess your current position, a formal letter of advice setting out your obligations, a tailored WHS compliance plan built around your industry and risk profile, and a WHS handbook your workers can actually use.
The Work Health and Safety Act applies to virtually every Australian business that engages workers, whether employees, contractors, labour hire, apprentices or volunteers. If you direct or influence the way work is carried out, you are almost certainly a PCBU, and the primary duty of care rests with you.
However, understanding that you have WHS obligations and properly discharging those obligations are two very different things.
We regularly advise employers who find themselves in one of the following situations: operating without formal WHS documentation and aware they are exposed; relying on generic templates that do not reflect their actual workplace risks or industry; responding to a near miss, a SafeWork NSW inspection, or a worker complaint; or expanding their workforce, engaging contractors, or moving into higher-risk activities without a compliant system in place.
If any of this sounds familiar, you are not alone and you are not too late.
Our WHS compliance service is designed to move your business from uncertainty to confidence, with legally sound, practical documentation tailored specifically to your operations and not copied from a generic template.
Everything starts with a consultation. One of our employment lawyers will meet with you (in person or online) to understand your business, workforce and the way you currently manage health and safety.
During this consultation, we’ll walk you through your obligations as a PCBU and explain the primary duty of care under the WHS Act. We’ll assess your current level of WHS compliance and identify gaps. We’ll also explain the due diligence obligations that apply to your officers and directors.
This isn’t a generic overview. We tailor the consultation to your business so you walk away understanding exactly what you need to do and why.
Following the consultation, we provide a formal letter of advice. This is a written document prepared by our lawyers that sets out your specific WHS obligations as a PCBU, the areas where your business is currently non-compliant or at risk, the steps you need to take to meet your obligations under the WHS Act and any time-sensitive issues that require immediate attention.
This is where we move from advice to action. Based on the consultation and letter of advice, we develop a WHS compliance plan that is tailored to your business, your industry and your risk profile.
Your compliance plan will cover hazard identification and risk assessment processes, a risk register specific to your workplace, the hierarchy of controls and how to apply it to your identified risks, safe work procedures for higher-risk tasks, incident reporting and investigation processes , worker consultation arrangements including health and safety representatives and a review schedule to keep your compliance plan current.
The final deliverable is a WHS handbook that you can distribute to your workers. This is the document that turns your compliance advice into something your team can understand, follow and refer to every day.
Your WHS handbook will provide a clear framework of policies, responsibilities, procedures, and processes to help your business manage health and safety, respond to incidents, and stay compliant.
We write the handbook in plain English (not legalese) so your workers can actually read it and know what’s expected of them. It’s also designed to be used as part of your induction process for new workers.
Under the WHS Act, a Person Conducting a Business or Undertaking (PCBU) includes sole traders, partnerships, companies, franchisees, not-for-profits that employ workers, and labour hire providers. If your business engages anyone to carry out work, and you direct or influence how that work is done, you’re a PCBU and these obligations apply to you.
For employers who have been operating without documented WHS systems or procedures.
Ideal for companies moving into higher-risk industries such as construction, manufacturing, warehousing or trades.
Helps manage shared WHS duties and responsibilities when working with contractors or labour hire.
For employers addressing workplace incidents or responding to SafeWork NSW improvement notices.
Supports business owners, officers and directors in meeting their legal due diligence obligations under the WHS Act.
Employment lawyers, not template sellers. There’s no shortage of websites selling generic WHS policy templates for $99. The problem is, a template doesn’t know your business, your risks or your industry. If SafeWork NSW turns up at your door, a generic template won’t demonstrate that you’ve taken reasonably practicable steps to manage the risks in your workplace. Our compliance plans and handbooks are drafted by employment lawyers who understand how WHS law actually works — and what regulators and courts look for when assessing compliance.
Specialists in workplace law. Employment and workplace law is all we do. We don’t juggle property settlements on Monday and WHS compliance on Tuesday. Every member of our team has dedicated their career to this area of law, which means you get advice that’s current, specific and grounded in real-world experience.
Practical, not theoretical. We’re small business owners ourselves, so we understand the gap between what the law says and what actually works in a busy workplace. Our compliance plans are designed to be implemented — not filed away in a drawer. We write in plain English, we focus on what matters, and we give you documentation that your workers will actually use.
Proactive, not reactive. The best time to get your WHS compliance in order is before something goes wrong. A worker injury, a SafeWork NSW prosecution, or a psychosocial hazard complaint is significantly more expensive, financially and reputationally, than investing in proper compliance now.
Fixed-fee and retainer options. We offer fixed-fee pricing for our WHS compliance services so you know exactly what you’re paying upfront. For businesses that want ongoing access to employment law advice, we also offer a monthly retainer with no lock-in contract.
If your WHS framework only covers physical safety, it’s no longer compliant. Australian WHS regulations have been significantly strengthened to require employers to identify, assess and control psychosocial hazards in the workplace.
Psychosocial hazards are factors in the design and management of work that can cause psychological harm. They include excessive workload and unreasonable job demands, low job control and lack of autonomy, poor workplace relationships including bullying and harassment, role ambiguity and conflict, inadequate organisational support, job insecurity, remote or isolated work, and exposure to traumatic events or content.
Under the current WHS Regulations, PCBUs must manage psychosocial risks using the same hierarchy of controls they apply to physical risks. This means identifying hazards, assessing the likelihood and severity of harm, implementing control measures, prioritising changes to work design and systems over individual-level interventions, and reviewing those controls regularly.
The Managing Psychosocial Hazards at Work Code of Practice and the new Sexual and Gender-Based Harassment Code of Practice (2025) provide practical guidance on how to meet these obligations. Victoria’s standalone Psychological Health Regulations also took effect on 1 December 2025, signalling a national shift in regulatory expectations.
Our WHS compliance plans and handbooks include psychosocial hazard management as standard, because it’s not optional anymore.
WHS non-compliance carries serious consequences for both businesses and individuals. The WHS Act establishes three categories of offence with escalating penalties.
Category 1 offences involve reckless conduct that exposes a person to a risk of death, serious injury or serious illness. Maximum penalties reach $3,461,500 for a body corporate and $693,000 or 5 years’ imprisonment for an individual, including officers and directors.
Category 2 offences involve a failure to comply with a health and safety duty that exposes a person to a risk of death, serious injury or serious illness. Maximum penalties are $1,731,500 for a body corporate and $346,500 for an individual.
Category 3 offences involve a failure to comply with a health and safety duty. Maximum penalties are $577,500 for a body corporate and $115,500 for an individual.
Beyond financial penalties, officers and directors of a PCBU have personal due diligence obligations. If your business fails to comply with WHS laws and you haven’t taken reasonable steps to ensure compliance, you can be prosecuted personally — even if you weren’t directly involved in the incident.
Industrial manslaughter laws, now in effect in most Australian jurisdictions including NSW, carry maximum penalties of 25 years’ imprisonment for individuals and $18 million for body corporates.
Getting your WHS compliance right isn’t just good practice. It’s how you protect your workers, your business and yourself.
Step 1 — Contact us. Call us or fill out the enquiry form below. We’ll have an initial conversation to understand your situation and confirm whether our WHS compliance service is the right fit.
Step 2 — WHS consultation. We conduct a thorough consultation to understand your business, your workforce and your current WHS arrangements. This can be done online or in person.
Step 3 — Letter of advice. We provide a formal letter of advice setting out your specific WHS obligations and any areas of non-compliance or risk.
Step 4 — Compliance plan and handbook. We develop your tailored WHS compliance plan and WHS handbook, ready for you to implement and distribute to your workers.
Step 5 — Ongoing support. If you need ongoing access to WHS and employment law advice, our retainer option gives you an employment lawyer on call — no lock-in contract, no surprises.
The majority of our services are fixed fee with no hidden costs including consultations, contracts and some claims.
We charge on an hourly basis depends on the situation and upon your approval.
We offer a retainer option for business owners who want ongoing services with no lock in contract. This gives you peace of mind that an employment lawyer is on-call and ready to assist you whenever you need it. It will also reduce the administrative burden of bulk legal services billing.
Your WHS obligations aren’t going away — and the regulatory environment is only getting stricter. Whether you’re starting from scratch or need to update an existing framework, our employment lawyers can help you get it right.
Call us or fill out the form below to book your WHS compliance consultation.
1800 565 975
in**@************************om.au
Unit 308/20A Lexington Dr, Bella Vista NSW 2153
We can take out of hours calls upon request.
Monday – Friday
09:00 am – 05:00 pm
Saturday & Sunday
By Appointment
