How to roster around public transport and late finishes

Written by Roster Flow. Published 11 September 2026.

Rosters are usually built around trade: when the doors open, when the last table leaves, when the shelves are full. How people get home comes second, if at all. Then the close runs long, the person who relies on the last bus misses it, and the next week they ask not to close again, or stop putting their hand up for late shifts.

This article is about setting finish and start times around the way staff actually travel. For the wider questions of trading late, such as evening penalty rates and whether the extra hours pay, see how to roster for late-night trading.

Find out how each person travels

Ask once, write it down, and ask again when something changes, such as a move, a new car or a change of timetable. You need a few facts for each person, not the details of their life.

Keep the answers next to each person’s availability, so whoever builds the roster sees both at once. The staff availability template has room for notes like these, and rostering staff with second jobs covers keeping it current when commitments change.

Work out the real latest finish

The finish time on the roster is not the time someone reaches the stop. Work back from the last service to find the latest time you can roster them to finish.

Latest rostered finish = last service, minus the walk to the stop, minus a buffer

1. Find the last service for that dayUse the timetable for the day of the roster. A Sunday close needs the Sunday timetable, not the weekday one.
2. Take off the walkTime the walk from the back door to the stop, at night, including any lock-up at the door.
3. Take off a bufferAllow 10 to 15 minutes for a close that runs over: a last customer, a till that will not balance, a delivery of glasses from the dishwasher.
4. Compare it with the closeIf the closing tasks need longer than that allows, start them earlier or give the last of them to someone who is not limited by transport.

For example, if the last train leaves at 23:52 and the walk is 8 minutes, a 15 minute buffer puts the latest finish at 23:29, so the rostered finish is 23:15. Round down, never up.

Shape the close around the last services

• Start closing tasks earlier. Cleaning that can happen in the last quiet hour does not have to wait until the doors shut. Opening and closing duties covers timing each task.
• Stagger the finish. Let the person with the earliest last service finish first, with a clear list of what they complete before they go.
• Rotate the latest close fairly among the people who can get home from it, rather than always giving it to whoever has a car. Fair weekend and closing-shift rotations shows how to set up the rotation.
• Do not build the roster on an unrostered lift. If the plan is that a manager drives someone home, it only works on the nights that manager is on.
• Finish the last two together. Two people leaving at the same time is better than one person locking up alone.

Early starts, and the gap between them

The first service of the morning sets the earliest start in the same way. A 5:30 bakery start or a 6:00 cafe opening can be out of reach for someone without a car, especially on a Sunday. Build start times from the first service plus the walk, and give the earliest starts to the people who can reach them.

Check the gap between a late close and the next start as well. Under the Restaurant Industry Award, an employee other than a casual must have a minimum break of 10 hours between finishing ordinary hours on one day and starting ordinary hours on the next, and 8 hours for a changeover of rosters (clause 15.1(e)). The Hospitality Industry (General) Award has the same break for full-time and part-time employees (clause 15.5(e)). The General Retail Industry Award requires 12 hours between finishing work one day and starting the next, or 10 hours by agreement (clause 16.6).

Travel to and from work comes out of that break, which is worth remembering for anyone with a long trip home. Safe Work Australia’s fatigue page says fatigue arises from work-related and non-work-related sources, and that businesses must eliminate or minimise the risk of fatigue, so far as is reasonably practicable.

What some awards say about transport at odd hours

Some awards require the employer to pay for transport when an employee starts or finishes at a time their usual transport does not reach. The conditions differ a great deal, so read the clause in the award that covers you before relying on any summary. The Fair Work Ombudsman’s Find my award tool identifies the award.

Every clause in the table turns partly on the employee’s regular means of transport, so rostering finish and start times that the regular transport still reaches is the practical first step. Other awards are worded differently or say nothing on the subject, and an enterprise agreement or contract can add its own terms. If you are unsure how a clause applies to a particular night, ask the Fair Work Ombudsman.

Plan for safety on the way out

Late finishes raise safety questions as well as transport ones. Safe Work Australia notes that working alone can increase the health and safety risks of any job, because workers may be isolated from support and assistance by where or when they are working (remote and isolated work). Its workplace violence and aggression page says that under the model work health and safety laws, businesses must manage the risks of violence and aggression, including from customers. What that requires of your business depends on the laws where you operate, so check with your state or territory work health and safety regulator.

On the roster side, these habits help:

• Roster the last two people to finish together where the hour, the location or the takings make leaving alone a risk
• Agree a quick message when the last person reaches their stop or car
• Do the cash-up and banking so nobody walks out with the takings alone after dark
• For employees under 18, talk with a parent or guardian about the finish time and the trip home

A worked example: a Friday close at a pub

This is an example, not a real business. A pub covered by the Hospitality Industry (General) Award serves meals in its bistro until 21:00 and closes the bar at 23:00 on Fridays. Three people close. The owner asks each how they get home and works out their latest finish with a 15 minute buffer.

Check the sums: 22:35 less 5 minutes and a 15 minute buffer is 22:15, and 23:40 less 8 minutes and 15 minutes is 23:17. In the first draft all three finished at 23:30, so Riley would reach the stop an hour after the last bus had gone. If Riley then finished at a time when it was unreasonable to travel home by their regular means of transport, and the pub did not provide transport or accommodation, clause 26.8 would require it to pay the reasonable cost of transport home.

In the revised roster, Riley packs down the bistro, which is closed from 21:00, and leaves at 22:15, reaching the stop at 22:20 with 15 minutes to spare. Jess and Sam start the bar close before the doors shut and finish together at 23:15, so nobody walks out alone, and Jess reaches the station at 23:23, 17 minutes before the last train. The revised close also uses 1 hour 45 minutes fewer rostered hours: 75 minutes off Riley’s shift and 15 minutes off each of the others.

Sam is also on Saturday. Finishing at 23:15 means Sam cannot start ordinary hours before 9:15 without breaking the 10 hour break in clause 15.5(e), so the Saturday opening goes to someone who did not close.

Keep the plan working

• Check the timetables again when they change, and before any roster that includes a public holiday. The public holidays page lists the dates for each state
• Ask new starters how they travel before their first late shift. A new employee’s first roster covers the rest of that first week
• When a close runs long, send the person with the earliest last service first
• Look at timesheets for closes that keep running past the rostered finish. The roster vs actual hours calculator shows how often it happens

Roster Flow keeps the week in view for everyone: availability and leave from staff phones, the roster published to everybody at once, clock ins that become timesheets, and approved hours sent to Xero, MYOB or a CSV file.

A checklist for late finishes and early starts

• Every person who closes or opens has told you how they travel
• Each has a latest finish or earliest start worked out from the timetable, the walk and a buffer
• Closing tasks start early enough for the finish times to hold
• The last two people finish together where leaving alone is a risk
• Every late closer’s next start leaves the break your award requires
• The transport clause in your award has been read, if it has one
• Timetables are checked again when they change and before public holidays

Sources

• Fair Work Commission: Hospitality Industry (General) Award 2020 [MA000009]
• Fair Work Commission: Registered and Licensed Clubs Award 2020 [MA000058]
• Fair Work Commission: General Retail Industry Award 2020 [MA000004]
• Fair Work Commission: Fast Food Industry Award 2020 [MA000003]
• Fair Work Commission: Restaurant Industry Award 2020 [MA000119]
• Safe Work Australia: fatigue
• Safe Work Australia: remote and isolated work
• Safe Work Australia: workplace violence and aggression
• Safe Work Australia: WHS regulators contact information
• Fair Work Ombudsman: find my award

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