What is a split shift? Examples, payments and rostering tips

Written by Roster Flow. Published 20 October 2026.

Hospitality runs on peaks. A restaurant that is full at lunch and full again at dinner has a quiet afternoon in between, and paying a cook to wait from 15:00 to 17:00 is money most small venues do not have. A split shift answers that by rostering the same person for both services with time off between them. It is common and useful, but it is not available in the same way under every award, and where it is allowed it comes with limits and payments of its own.

What counts as a split shift

The site’s glossary describes a split shift as a working day in two parts with a gap between them, such as lunch service and dinner service. Two ideas from the awards help pin it down.

• The spread of hours. The Restaurant award defines the spread of hours as the period between when an employee starts and finishes work within any period of 24 hours (clause 2). On a split day it runs from the start of the first part to the finish of the last, with the gap included.
• Meal breaks are separate. The Clubs award pays its broken periods of work allowance when ordinary hours on a day are worked in more than one period, other than for the meal breaks in clause 17 (clause 19.2(c)). Under that clause, a meal break inside a shift does not make the day a broken one.

Some awards use the term broken shift for a similar pattern, and what it means depends on the award that uses it.

Examples of split shifts

The first two fit inside a 12 hour spread. The third runs 14 hours from first start to last finish, which is over the 12 hour limit for split shifts in the Restaurant and Hospitality awards. Under the Clubs award, the spread that applies depends on the arrangement of ordinary hours, as set out below.

How five awards treat split shifts

The rules below are from the awards as consolidated to 1 July 2026. The difference between them is large, so confirm which award covers your staff with the Fair Work Ombudsman’s Find my award tool before you build a split into the roster.

The allowance amounts are adjusted over time, and each award lists its current amounts in its summary of monetary allowances, such as Schedule C of the Restaurant and Clubs awards. Hourly rates are on the Restaurant, Hospitality and Clubs award pay rates pages.

If your business is covered by the General Retail or Fast Food award, the ordinary hours clause does not set up a day in two parts the way the hospitality awards do. Ask the Fair Work Ombudsman before rostering one, rather than assuming the hospitality rules carry across.

The gap between the parts, and the break between days

Neither the Restaurant nor the Hospitality award sets a minimum or maximum length for the time between the parts. The 12 hour spread is what limits it, and the gap and the parts decide the allowance.

• Hospitality award: the length of the gap sets the amount. Clause 26.14 pays one amount per day where the period between shifts is between 2 and 3 hours, and a larger amount where it is more than 3 hours. A gap of exactly 3 hours is in the first band, because it is not more than 3. The clause does not set an amount for a gap shorter than 2 hours.
• Restaurant award: the length of each part sets the count. Clause 21.3 pays the allowance for each separate work period of 2 hours or more on a broken working day, so a part shorter than 2 hours does not attract it.
• Clubs award: one allowance per day. Clause 19.2(c) pays the allowance per day for the broken work period worked, to employees other than casuals.

The break between one working day and the next runs from the end of the last part. The Fair Work Ombudsman’s page on breaks notes that awards may provide a minimum amount of time off between the end of one shift and the start of another. Clause 15.1(e) of the Restaurant award and clause 15.5(e) of the Hospitality award require at least 10 hours between finishing ordinary hours on one day and starting ordinary hours on the next, or 8 hours at a changeover of rosters. The Restaurant rule applies to employees other than casuals, and the Hospitality rule to full-time and part-time employees.

Meal and rest breaks inside the day need a check too. Clause 16.2 of the Restaurant award sets breaks by the hours worked in any one shift, while the heading of its break table refers to hours worked per day, so whether a split day counts as one shift or two for breaks is worth confirming with the Fair Work Ombudsman before you rely on either reading. Where a break could be due under either reading, rostering it keeps you covered.

Casual and part-time employees on split shifts

• Casuals and the minimum engagement. Under the Restaurant and Hospitality awards, a casual is engaged and paid for at least 2 consecutive hours on each occasion they are required to attend work (clause 11.3), and the Clubs award pays most casuals for at least 2 hours on each occasion (clause 11.5). Roster each part of a casual’s split day for at least 2 hours.
• Casuals and the allowance. The split shift allowances in the Restaurant and Hospitality awards apply to full-time and part-time employees (clauses 21.3(a) and 26.14(a)), and the Clubs allowance to employees other than casuals (clause 19.2(c)).
• Casual daily limits. Hours in both parts count towards the 12 hours in a day or shift after which a casual is paid overtime rates under the Restaurant, Hospitality and Clubs awards (clauses 11.5, 11.4 and 11.4).
• Part-time availability and daily hours. Under the Restaurant, Hospitality and Clubs awards, a part-time employee must not be rostered outside their availability (clause 10.7), so both parts must fit inside it. The Restaurant award keeps a part-time employee’s day between 3 and 11.5 hours (clause 10.7(b)), and the Hospitality award between 3 and 11.5 ordinary hours, excluding meal breaks (clause 15.2).
• Employees under 18. The Restaurant, Hospitality and Clubs awards say an employee under 18 must not be required to work more than 10 hours in a shift (clause 13.3).

A worked example: a split Saturday in a restaurant kitchen

A restaurant covered by the Restaurant Industry Award rosters Jordan, a full-time cook, for lunch from 10:00 to 14:30 and dinner from 17:30 to 22:00 on Saturday.

On Friday the owner asks Jordan to come in at 9:00 on Saturday to take a delivery. That would stretch the spread to 13 hours, from 9:00 to 22:00, which is over the maximum. The simplest fix is to have someone else take the delivery. If the kitchen can close earlier, 9:00 to 13:30 and 17:00 to 21:00 would keep the spread at exactly 12 hours. Either way, a change this close to the day needs Jordan’s agreement, because clause 15.3(d) otherwise requires 7 days’ notice.

The restaurant also rosters Tess, a casual kitchen hand, from 11:30 to 14:00 and 18:00 to 19:30. The second part is only 1.5 hours, below the 2 hour minimum engagement in clause 11.3, so the owner extends it to 18:00 to 20:00. No split shift allowance is payable, because clause 21.3 covers full-time and part-time employees, and her 4.5 hours across the day are well under the 12 hour casual limit in clause 11.2.

Under the Hospitality award, a similar day is assessed a little differently. A part-time bartender working 11:00 to 14:00 and 17:00 to 21:00 has a gap of exactly 3 hours, which falls in the between 2 and 3 hours band of clause 26.14, a spread of 10 hours inside the 12 hour limit in clause 15.2(e), and 7 ordinary hours, inside the 3 to 11.5 hours in clause 15.2.

Rostering tips for split shifts

• Consult before building them into a pattern. Before changing someone’s regular roster to include split shifts, clause 33 of the Restaurant award and clause 39 of the Hospitality award require you to give them information about the change, invite their views, including about family or caring responsibilities, and consider what they say.
• Keep the spread in view. Write the first start and last finish beside every split day on the draft roster, not just the times of the two parts.
• Make each part long enough. Plan every part at or above the minimum engagement for casuals, and remember that the Restaurant award’s allowance counts only parts of 2 hours or more.
• Watch late finishes. Clause 23.1(a) of the Restaurant award pays a full-time employee at overtime rates for work outside the spread of hours or rostered hours set out in clause 15, so a dinner part that runs late needs checking against both.
• Cost the allowance. Add split shift allowances to the week’s estimate. The roster cost calculator estimates the week from your own rates, and the split shift roster template is a layout to start from.

For the rest of the week around the split days, the restaurant rostering guide covers building a roster from covers and services.

Roster Flow keeps split days in the same week as everything else: 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 split shifts

• You know whether your award provides for split shifts at all
• Every split day fits the award’s maximum spread
• Each part of a casual’s day meets the minimum engagement
• Split shift allowances are counted for the employees who get them
• Both parts of a part-time employee’s day fall inside their availability
• The break before the next day is measured from the end of the last part
• Break entitlements across the day have been checked
• Anyone moving to regular split shifts has been consulted first

Sources

• Fair Work Commission: Restaurant Industry Award 2020 [MA000119]
• 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 Ombudsman: breaks
• Fair Work Ombudsman: find my award

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