Made redundant? A 4-week plan for Australia

TL;DR: You have just been made redundant. This is a practical four-week plan, written for a worker on A$55,000 to A$85,000 in customer service, call centre, claims or admin. Week 1 is entitlements and paperwork. Week 2 is recovery and resume. Week 3 is target list and applications. Week 4 is interview prep and offer handling. For 2026-27 (dismissals from 1 July 2026) the ATO tax-free cap on a genuine redundancy is A$13,598 plus A$6,801 per completed year of service. The Centrelink JobSeeker liquid assets threshold is A$5,500 single and A$11,000 partnered. The median Australian job search lasted 14 weeks in December 2025, so four weeks of focused work matters. This plan is general information, not legal or financial advice.

Before Week 1 starts: the news itself

The honest part first. Most Australians made redundant in 2025-2026 are not bad at their jobs. The Australian Bureau of Statistics counted 268,000 retrenchments in the year to February 2025, about 12% of all job-leavers (ABS Job Mobility, February 2025). Most rounds are restructure-driven, and AI is now an explicit part of the restructure narrative at CBA, Telstra, ANZ, NAB, Westpac, Optus, Wesfarmers and Suncorp (Information Age, 2025-2026).

That is the context. Now the plan.

Week 1: entitlements and paperwork

The first seven days are admin. You will not feel like doing them. Do them anyway.

Confirm your redundancy is "genuine". Under the Fair Work Act, a genuine redundancy is one where your job is no longer required to be done by anyone, and the employer has met any consultation obligations in your award or agreement. If those tests are not met, the redundancy may be an unfair dismissal. The Fair Work Ombudsman has the test in plain English (fairwork.gov.au).

Read your offer letter twice. It should set out: the redundancy amount, notice period, payment in lieu of notice (if any), accrued annual leave, accrued long service leave, any ex gratia or above-award component, and the calculation of years of continuous service.

Check your NES redundancy pay against the schedule. The National Employment Standards minimums (Fair Work Ombudsman, current):

1 to under 2 years: 4 weeks of pay
2 to under 3 years: 6 weeks
3 to under 4 years: 7 weeks
4 to under 5 years: 8 weeks
5 to under 6 years: 10 weeks
6 to under 7 years: 11 weeks
7 to under 8 years: 13 weeks
8 to under 9 years: 14 weeks
9 to under 10 years: 16 weeks
10 years and over: 12 weeks (lower because long service leave applies)

If your employer has fewer than 15 employees, the NES does not require redundancy pay. Your award or contract may still require it.

Check the tax treatment. For the 2026-27 income year, the genuine redundancy tax-free base is A$13,598, plus A$6,801 for every completed year of service (Australian Taxation Office, last updated 17 April 2026). A worked example: eight completed years of service gives A$13,598 + (8 x A$6,801) = A$68,006 tax-free. Anything above that is taxed under ETP rules at a concessional rate, up to the 2026-27 ETP cap of A$270,000. Unused annual leave and unused long service leave are paid separately and taxed under Schedule 7, not as part of the ETP.

Tax-free redundancy, 2026-27

Base amount: A$13,598. Per completed year of service: A$6,801. ETP cap: A$270,000. Sources: Australian Taxation Office, "Employment termination payments", last updated 17 April 2026.

Request your Employment Separation Certificate (SU001). Your employer must complete it on request, and Centrelink needs it to assess JobSeeker. The Services Australia form is at servicesaustralia.gov.au/su001.

Lodge your JobSeeker claim early, even if you have a payout. Two waiting periods apply:

Liquid Assets Waiting Period (LAWP). Triggered when liquid assets are A$5,500 or more (single, no dependants) or A$11,000 or more (partnered, or single with dependants). The maximum 13-week wait kicks in at A$11,500 single and A$23,000 partnered.
Income Maintenance Period (IMP). Your redundancy and leave payouts are treated as ordinary income spread over a period equal to the weeks of pay you received. A 10-week redundancy pay equals roughly a 10-week IMP.

(Both: Services Australia, current.)

Roll the rest into super if it makes sense. Voluntary super contributions for the financial year may have headroom. Don't move money you'll need to live on. Talk to a licensed financial adviser if the redundancy payout is large.

Update your LinkedIn quietly. Headline first, "Open to work" filter set to recruiters only, profile photo current. Keep the redundancy out of the headline. The "I was just laid off" post can wait until Week 2 or never.

For the maths step by step, our redundancy payout calculator works out the NES minimum and the tax on your payout in one screen. It does not work out notice. The deeper read on tax is on our redundancy tax page.

Week 2: recovery and resume

You cannot job-hunt your way out of redundancy in week one. The body needs a week to come down.

The mental health honest line. Unemployed Australians aged 16 to 64 had a 12-month mental disorder rate of 36.1% in the latest ABS data, compared with 22.8% for employed people (ABS National Study of Mental Health and Wellbeing 2020-2022). This is normal. It is also why week two is for recovery, not for sending 50 applications.

If you are struggling, Beyond Blue (1300 22 4636) and Lifeline (13 11 14) are both 24/7. We are not a mental health service.

Get the resume to two pages. SEEK's career advice is clear: an Australian resume should fit on one or two pages, with the most recent two roles taking the most space. Drop the 20-year-old qualifications. Strip the "results-driven team player" line and the AI tells that recruiter screening software now flags. Use specific numbers: deals closed, calls handled, NPS lifts, dollars saved.

Write three resume versions. One for your current sector, one for a sideways move (claims, customer success, NDIS coordination, health admin), and one for an inside move (a promotion at a similar employer). The free Career Change Check shows roles you are already close to.

Update one LinkedIn About section. Six lines. What you do, the size of the operation, the outcomes you delivered, the specific tools and industries. Avoid the personal-essay format.

Make a list of 30 people to talk to. Old managers, peers, vendors, customers, recruiters you have actually worked with. Not strangers from Slack groups. We will contact them in week three.

Week 3: target list and applications

This is when the pace picks up.

Build a target list of 20 employers. Real Australian companies, with addresses you could drive to. Five "warm" (your current sector, your contacts know people there). Ten "stretch" (adjacent sector, the move you want to make). Five "back-pocket" (lower-paying but reliable, in case the stretch doesn't land in eight weeks).

Apply with discipline. August 2025 set a record for applications per SEEK job ad, after June 2025 ran 16.4% above the prior year (SEEK Employment Dashboards, 2025). That means the bar to stand out has gone up. Fewer applications, better targeted, beat 50 spray-and-pray. Aim for five quality applications per week, with a tailored cover note for each.

Activate referrals. Pick eight people from your list of 30 and message them. Subject line: your name + the role you are applying for. Body: three sentences. The role link, the company, and the request ("if you know anyone there, could you pass my CV on?"). Globally, employee referrals account for around 30% of hires. AU-specific referral data is patchy, but the pattern holds.

Read the job description out loud before you apply. If you cannot say the responsibilities in your own words, the cover note will sound like ChatGPT wrote it. AI-tell-detector software is now used by half the major AU recruiters. Plain, specific, AU-English copy beats generic.

Use LinkedIn "Open to Work" with the recruiter filter only. Do not flip the green frame on your profile photo. It signals desperation to the people you want to impress.

Week 4: interview prep and offer handling

The interviews start coming in week three or four. Be ready.

Prepare 5 to 7 STAR examples. Situation, Task, Action, Result. SEEK's career advice and most AU recruiters use the STAR framework explicitly. Pick stories from the last three years that show you handling: a difficult customer, a change you led, a metric you moved, a conflict you defused, a deadline you saved. Write them down. Rehearse them out loud, not in your head.

Behavioural interviews are the default. "Tell me about a time when you..." is the question shape you will hear. The interviewer is not testing your honesty. They are testing whether you can structure a story under mild pressure. STAR is the structure.

Have three questions ready for the end. Not "what's the culture like." Specifics: "What does success in this role look like in the first 90 days," "Who else is on this team and what are they working on," "What's the biggest open question in this role that the previous person didn't answer."

Salary negotiation. Ask for the band before you give a number. If forced, use the SEEK band for the role title in your city plus 5 to 10%. If the offer is below band, ask for the rationale. Do not accept on the call. Take 24 hours.

Read the offer letter twice. Probation period (3 to 6 months is normal). Notice period (4 weeks is normal). Non-compete (often unenforceable in Australia, but worth knowing it is there).

What if four weeks isn't enough

It often is not. The median job search in Australia was 14 weeks in December 2025, down from 16 in November (ABS via CEIC, 2025). If you are 12 weeks in and not landing, three honest moves:

Drop the salary anchor. A reasonable lateral with a 5% pay cut at the right employer is better than holding out for a 10% lift that does not come.
Add a stretch sector you did not consider in week three. Claims, NDIS coordination, health admin and ops coordinator are four that could suit former call centre and admin workers.
Take outplacement seriously if your employer paid for it. LHH and Hays Transition are the two larger AU outplacement providers. The third-party estimate is A$2,400 to A$11,000 per employee for LHH, paid by the employer (industry pricing aggregator, 2025). Use the coach. Do the workshops. The platform sits unused by most participants, which is a waste of a paid-for asset.

What to do this week

You are not in crisis. You are in week one of a four-week plan that has worked for hundreds of Australians in the same seat as you. Three things, in order:

Take the Career Change Check. Three minutes, free. It shows roles you are already close to. Use it to write the target list in week three.
Use the redundancy payout calculator. Get the actual tax-free figure and the actual notice period.
Bookmark the redundancy hub and the at-risk jobs hub. They will be useful again in week three.

FAQ

How much of a genuine redundancy payment is tax-free in 2026-27? For the 2026-27 income year, the genuine redundancy tax-free base is A$13,598, plus A$6,801 for each completed year of service. A worked example: 8 completed years equals A$68,006 tax-free. Source: Australian Taxation Office, last updated 17 April 2026.

Will my redundancy stop me getting JobSeeker? It can delay it. The Liquid Assets Waiting Period applies if you have A$5,500 or more (single) or A$11,000 or more (partnered) in liquid assets. The Income Maintenance Period treats redundancy and leave payouts as ordinary income across a period equal to the weeks paid. Lodge your claim early so the clock starts.

Can I negotiate my redundancy package? Sometimes. The NES amounts are minimums. If your employer has paid above-NES amounts in past rounds, ask. If your award or enterprise agreement specifies higher amounts, point to the section. Notice periods are also sometimes negotiable. A union or employment lawyer can read the offer in 30 minutes.

My employer has fewer than 15 staff. Am I owed redundancy pay? Probably not under the NES, which exempts small businesses. Your award or contract may still oblige redundancy pay. The Fair Work Ombudsman has a clear page on the small business exemption (fairwork.gov.au).

Should I roll my ETP into super? Most ETPs cannot be rolled directly into super. The decision is more often about whether to use the cash to make voluntary concessional or non-concessional contributions, and that depends on your taxable income and the contribution caps. Talk to a licensed financial adviser before moving funds.

Is this redundancy "genuine" or is it actually unfair dismissal? Genuine redundancy under the Fair Work Act requires that the job is no longer required to be done by anyone, and that the employer has met consultation obligations in your award or agreement. If those conditions are not met, you may have a claim for unfair dismissal, which has tight time limits (21 days). The Fair Work Commission is the right place to start, or a union or employment lawyer.

How long until I get a new job? The median job search in Australia was 14 weeks in December 2025 (ABS via CEIC). That is the median. Some land in four weeks. Some take six months. Your sector, your age, your location, and how targeted your applications are all matter more than your effort level.

Made redundant in the AI wave: a four-week plan that actually works