Workers - ACT Leave

Serving you the valuable benefits of portable long service leave

When you’re registered with ACT Leave, your portable long service leave benefits travel with you when you move between registered employers within the industry.

If you do relevant work in the services industry, your employer should register you for portable long service leave. If you are not sure if you are registered, contact us.

Eligible workers in the services industry

In the Services Industry Scheme, workers are classified as either employees or contractors.

	Registration	Levy	Benefit type	Notes
Employees	Mandatory – must be registered by the employer	1.07% of gross ordinary wages, paid by the employer	Accrued portable long service leave	Includes full-time, part-time and casual employees performing relevant work. Also includes employees on a visa that allows them to work in Australia
Apprentices	Mandatory – must be registered by the employer	Exempt Note, Australian School-based Apprentices (ASBAs) are not classified as an apprentice under the Act. Levies are payable on their reported gross ordinary wages.	Accrued portable long service leave	Employers must provide a copy of the apprenticeship training contract when registering an employee as an apprentice.
Contractors	Optional – can self-register	A percentage of ordinary remuneration or profit component, paid by the contractor. The rate will be advised prior to scheme commencement.	Contribution refund plus interest	Includes working directors, sole traders or individual partners in a partnership

Registering in the services industry

Workers will be sent a confirmation of registration from ACT Leave as soon as their employer reports their details on the first quarterly return after entry into the Services Industry Scheme (except existing contract cleaning employees already registered with ACT Leave). The first quarterly report for the new industries of hairdressing and beauty and accommodation and food services is due in October 2026.

Use your registration details to log into the portal to:

check and update your contact details
see your service history
update your contact details if you didn’t receive an annual statement.

If you don’t think you’ve been registered and you have not received a letter from us with your registration details, contact us.

ACT Leave provides workers with access to their annual statement, usually in September each year, which lists their employer/s, ordinary remuneration and credited service days recorded for them over the past financial year. Workers are encouraged to check their statement carefully to make sure all service has been reported correctly

Sole traders, individual partners in a partnership and working directors

You can still benefit from the portable long service leave scheme if you’re a:

contractor (sole trader or individual in a partnership)
working director.

To do this, register with us as a voluntary member to contribute towards a portable long service leave benefit. You can also backdate your service up to 1 year from the date you register after scheme commencement but cannot pre-date scheme commencement.

When you claim, instead of taking leave, we’ll give you back the amount you paid in levies plus interest.

If the scheme fund investment made a return, you’ll receive interest of 75% of the rate of return (less any associated fees) or nil (if the fund did not make a return or made a loss). Interest rates are reviewed regularly.
View the current interest rates.

Registering as a contractor

To register as a contractor, complete and submit the Contractor / Working Director Registration form after the scheme commences on 1 April 2025.

Recording service as a contractor

If you register with us as a contractor, you must lodge quarterly returns through the worker portal.

Each quarter, you’ll declare:

how many days you worked
your gross ordinary wages or profit part of your income for the quarterly return period.

You’ll pay a levy on what you declare, which will be advised closer to the commencement of the scheme. Most contractors use a minimum daily rate of pay to calculate their gross ordinary wages.

If you have both employee and contractor service recorded, you’ll receive the sum of the worker part and your contractor part when you claim.

Accruing portable long service leave in the services industry

As a registered services industry worker in the ACT, you accrue 6.06 weeks of portable long service leave for every 7 years of service.

Your service recorded as an employee and/or a contractor counts towards an entitlement.

For example, you would have a total of 7 years of service in the scheme if you recorded:

5 years as an employee
2 years as a contractor.

All service accrual for current contract cleaning workers will move over into the new scheme automatically with them.

The introduction of the Services Industry Scheme does not mean workers will lose any existing long service leave entitlements already accrued with their current employer.

For long service leave accrued before the commencement of the Services Industry Scheme, the provisions of the Long Service Leave Act 1976, and/or the worker’s employment contract applies. A basic entitlement prescribed in the 1976 Act requires a minimum of 7 years of service with one employer before an employee can access their long service leave entitlement. Workers are encouraged to speak to their current employer regarding any long service leave accrued prior to the introduction of the portable long service leave arrangements.

See more information on entitlements and how to claim.

Deregistration

If you have had no service recorded with ACT Leave for 4 years, your portable long service leave account will be deregistered (closed).

We’ll let you know 3 to 6 months before this is due to happen.

To avoid deregistration, contact us:

if you have service recorded interstate so we can update your records and combine your service when you make a claim
to provide proof of continued work in the ACT services industry.

Recording work in interstate service industries

While some schemes are portable between other states and territories, the services industry scheme is not, with the exception of work in the contract cleaning industry.

Portable long service leave for the contract cleaning industry is available in the ACT, NSW and Queensland, meaning you can take your benefit with you to any of these states.

Work in other service industries within the scheme is not yet recognised by other states as the ACT is the first jurisdiction to implement portable long service leave for service industries.

Only work performed in the ACT counts towards your entitlement.

Recording missing service in the services industry

If you think your employer has not recorded your service with ACT Leave, submit a missing service claim form so we can investigate your claim.

You will need to ensure you were:

working in the services industry in the ACT
performing relevant work
an employee.

Along with the completed form, you will need to provide evidence that you were performing relevant work in the industry during the period of missing service. Evidence could include:

PAYG payment summaries for the period of employment you are claiming missing service
pay slips for the period you are claiming missing service
employment contract with the employer
employment separation certificate if applicable
position description.

Portable long service leave for workers in the services industry