Labour Hire Licence QLD: Fees, How to Apply and Penalties

If you supply workers to another business in Queensland and you pay them, you need a labour hire licence before the first shift. The fee follows last financial year's wages: $1,197.58 under $1.5 million, $3,592.74 from $1.5 million to under $5 million, and $5,987.91 at $5 million and over. You apply online through the regulator's portal. Simple applications are normally decided within 28 business days. The licence lasts up to a year, and you report every six months. Unlicensed supply carries up to 3,000 penalty units for a company.

That is the scheme at a glance. The Labour Hire Licensing Act 2017 is the law behind it, and Labour Hire Licensing Queensland is the unit inside the Office of Industrial Relations that runs it. This page then gives a temp desk recruiter the detail. It covers who the licence attaches to, what the fee covers, the documents the regulator asks for, the reporting clock, and what happens to people who skip it. Licences do not travel between states. If you also place workers in Victoria, South Australia or the ACT, each is a separate application. The hub page on the labour hire licence in Australia walks through all four schemes.

Who needs a labour hire licence in Queensland

This test is simple to state and easy to get wrong. A labour hire provider is a business that supplies workers to another person or business to do work, and is obliged to pay those workers for it. That obligation can be indirect, as it is when the workers come through another business in the chain. The regulator's own examples include a contractor supplying pickers to a grower and a group training organisation placing apprentices. They also include an employment agency supplying temporary administration staff to a client. That last one is a temp desk.

It does not matter where you are based. A provider in Sydney or Auckland supplying workers to a Brisbane site needs a Queensland licence.

Three things sit outside the scheme, and the first is the one recruiters care about most:

• Recruitment and permanent placement. If the candidate goes onto the client's payroll, you are a recruiter, not a labour hire provider, and no licence is needed.
• Supply within a corporate group, in house secondments, and an executive officer sent as the only worker.
• Workers above the Fair Work high income threshold who are not covered by an award or agreement. That threshold is indexed each 1 July, and the regulator currently lists it at $190,100 a year.

Construction and trades trip on one line: a contract for labour against a contract for a result. Say a business sends workers to a licensed trade contractor at an hourly rate, supplies no materials and carries no defects. That is labour, and it needs a licence. A subcontractor who owns the whole electrical scope for a fixed sum, carries the commercial risk and fixes its own defects is not. If your arrangement sits near the line, the regulator's table of examples and a lawyer are the two things to read before you quote a client.

The licence attaches to the entity that employs and pays the workers, not to the person who found them. For a recruiter going out on his own, the company set up to run the desk is the applicant. Those behind it are the ones who have to be fit and proper.

Hosts carry an obligation too. A business in Queensland may only use a licensed provider. The public register is the regulator's searchable list of every licensed provider, and your clients can look you up on it by business name, ABN or address. Expect them to, and have the licence number ready for the first call.

What a Queensland labour hire licence costs

The fee tiers are three price bands set by the total wages you paid to labour hire workers in Queensland in the financial year before you apply. Wages are counted the way WorkCover Queensland counts them for premiums. The Labour Hire Licensing Regulation 2018 is the instrument under the Act that sets the tiers and the fee units. Each year the regulator converts those units to dollars.

• Tier 1, total wages under $1.5 million: $1,197.58.
• Tier 2, total wages of $1.5 million to under $5 million: $3,592.74.
• Tier 3, total wages of $5 million and over: $5,987.91.

Three things about that list:

• A new business has no prior year. Your tier is set on the wages you project to pay this financial year and next. Thirty workers out on $50,000 a year each is $1.5 million in wages, which is already tier 2. Project it honestly; the tier follows the projection, not your hopes.
• You pay the same fee at application, at each annual renewal, and at restoration if you let the licence lapse. Budget for it every year, not once.
• Fees go up each 1 July under the Queensland Government's indexation policy. Those above are the regulator's current published fees. Check its licensing page before you pay.

The fee is the cheapest part of the licence. You also have to show the regulator that the business is financially viable. For a new business the evidence list is:

• A business plan.
• A bank statement showing funds to cover start up costs.
• Sample employment contracts.
• A statement of financial position.
• A projected profit and loss.
• A cash flow statement.
• A WorkCover Queensland policy. A nominal policy is enough to start.
• A public liability policy. A quote is enough to start.

An established business adds three months of bank statements, the last financial year's statements and tax return, ATO account summaries, and a quarter of payroll records. It also adds timesheets, payslips and proof of wages and super for a sample of workers.

Read that list again as a recruiter. Nothing on it is hard to produce. Every item is a thing you already know how to do, because you have watched the agency do it for years. What the list does not mention is the money underneath it. Someone has to float the pay of 40 workers on Wednesday when the client pays weeks later. Someone has to carry trade credit insurance on the invoice in case the client folds. Solo operators are hard to insure for that. An insurer spreads its risk across many clients, and a startup with one client has all of its risk on one name. The licence is one brick. That is the wall.

How to apply for a labour hire licence in Queensland

You apply online through the regulator's portal at ols.oir.qld.gov.au. Do the paperwork before you touch the portal. The steps below are in that order.

1. Settle the applicant. A company applies in its own name, and its directors are the executive officers who must be fit and proper. Partners apply jointly. The Act bars you from applying for two years after a licence of yours was cancelled, and for three months after an application of yours was refused.
2. Name at least one nominated officer. A nominated officer is a person who runs the business day to day or helps manage it. That person has to be reasonably available to the regulator and the public during business hours. For a one person desk, that is you.
3. Complete the fit and proper declarations. Each applicant, nominated officer and executive officer signs Form 4, the fit and proper person declaration. The business keeps the signed copies. The regulator can check criminal history. It looks at convictions under relevant laws, licence refusals or cancellations in any state, insolvency, and bans on managing companies.
4. Build the viability pack from the list above, and have your WorkCover Queensland accident insurance policy number ready. The application asks for it.
5. Pull together five years of work health and safety and workers' compensation compliance history for each applicant. Add anything relevant about compliance with the other laws that apply to labour hire providers. A new business declares what applies.
6. Register an account on the portal. If an accountant or adviser lodges for you, they are an authorised delegate. You complete Form 1, the authorisation of administrative user, and keep it on file in case the Office of Industrial Relations asks for it.
7. Complete the application, upload the documents and pay the fee. You can save a part finished application and come back to it. Once lodged, changes go through the regulator, not the form.
8. Wait for the decision. Once the application is lodged and the fee paid, simple applications are normally decided within 28 business days. Anything that needs more information takes longer, and the clock runs at the speed you answer.
9. Do not supply a worker until the licence is granted. A pending application is not a licence, and a client who engages you on the strength of one is exposed as well.

Two more things the regulator says plainly. A Victorian, South Australian or ACT licence does not cover Queensland. You still apply, though the other licence may count in your favour on fitness and viability. And a new business licence may carry a condition, such as a mandatory inspection after a stated period.

If you are building the desk from scratch, the licence is one step of a longer list. The guide to how to start a temp agency in Australia sets out the order.

Renewal, and what happens if you miss it

A licence is granted for a term of up to one year. Renewal costs the same as the application fee for your tier. Apply before the expiry date. If you lodge a renewal before expiry and the regulator has not decided it by then, the licence continues until the decision. If the licence expires with no renewal lodged, you have 28 days to apply for restoration, and the restoration fee is the same tier amount. Miss that window and the business is unlicensed, with everything that follows below.

Reporting every six months

Every licence comes with a reporting clock, and it starts the day the licence is granted or renewed. Every licensee reports to the regulator every six months. Each report is due within 28 days of the end of the period. You lodge it in the portal under Licences, using the Start Report button. That button only appears once the period ends. Once submitted, it cannot be edited.

What the report asks for:

• Worker numbers: those registered with you and those supplied in the period. One worker sent to two clients counts as two supplies.
• Visa holders, by visa subclass and country of origin.
• Arrangement types: casual, permanent, fixed term, apprenticeship or traineeship, piecework, and which entitlements accrue.
• Industries supplied to, by ANZSIC code, and occupations, by ANZSCO code.
• Local government areas where the work was done.
• Any accommodation or other services provided to workers, and what you charged for them.
• Your compliance with relevant laws, including any enforcement action started by a regulator.
• Notifiable incidents under the Work Health and Safety Act 2011, and workers' compensation applications by supplied workers, to the best of your knowledge.

A reporting guide and a template sit on the regulator's site, and its advice is to collect this information through the licence period rather than rebuild it at the deadline. Treat it as a standing field in your placement system from the first shift. Keep a copy of every document you use to prepare a report. The Regulation requires it. The viability documents have to be kept for seven years after you stop holding a licence.

Separately, you have 14 days to tell the regulator about a prescribed change in circumstances. That covers a change of name, business name or contact details, a relevant conviction, and insolvency or administration. It also covers a change in compliance history such as an infringement notice, starting to provide accommodation, and starting to supply workers on visas. The notice goes through your portal account.

Late reports and missed notices are where licences get suspended. Grounds for suspension include a report not submitted as required, and materially incorrect information in a report or application. Breaches of relevant laws, loss of fit and proper status and loss of viability sit alongside them. Cancellation follows a show cause notice.

Penalties and offences

Queensland expresses its penalties in penalty units. A unit's dollar value is set by regulation and indexed each year, and the regulator's penalties page shows the current conversion. Maximums under the Act are:

• Providing labour hire services without a licence: 3,000 penalty units for a corporation, or 1,034 penalty units or three years imprisonment for an individual.
• Advertising, or holding out in any way, that you provide labour hire services without a licence: 200 penalty units. A website or a job ad offering temps before the licence is granted risks being exactly that.
• A business using an unlicensed provider: the same scale as the provider. It is a reasonable excuse if the provider was shown on the register as licensed when the arrangement was made, which is why a careful host checks it before signing.
• Entering an avoidance arrangement designed to get around the Act: the same scale again.
• Failing to report within 28 days of a reporting period ending: 200 penalty units.
• Failing to notify a prescribed change in circumstances within 14 days: 200 penalty units.
• Transferring, selling, lending or hiring out the licence: 200 penalty units or one year imprisonment.
• Failing to produce a copy of the licence when an inspector, a worker or a client asks: 100 penalty units.
• Giving an official false or misleading information: 100 penalty units.

Enforcement is not theoretical. By August 2025 the regulator had recorded 28 successful prosecutions and $2 million in court penalties since the scheme began in 2018. One of those prosecutions, in the Mareeba Magistrates Court, was an operator who used a licence number registered to another entity. That let it pass as licensed while supplying pickers to two farms. That is the case the register exists to catch. It is also the reason your clients will look you up rather than take your word. Licensing action runs alongside the court cases. The regulator's quarterly bulletin lists the providers whose licences were suspended or cancelled. In the April to June 2026 quarter alone it granted 175 licences, refused 7 applications and cancelled 2.

The Act does not fine you for breaching other laws. Holding the licence depends on complying with them, though. An award underpayment or a lapsed WorkCover policy comes back as a licence problem, through suspension or cancellation.

What we see across the recruiters we work with

This is what xrecruiter sees across its own partner agencies, not a statistic about the market. Most recruiters who go solo stall inside six months. A licence is rarely the thing that stops a temp desk recruiter. He reads a page like this one and sees paperwork he already knows how to produce. What stops him is the money underneath it: the payroll float, the insurance stack, WorkCover and collections. Each one has its own way of hurting a new agency in its first year. Each is a supplier conversation he has never had to have.

Collections is the one he underestimates. Phil's only job is to make sure your invoices get paid. We measured the result the way the industry does, by days sales outstanding: DSO 22 vs 45 days, ours against the average. Cash that lands sooner is the difference between making Wednesday's pay run from the account and borrowing to make it.

Frequently asked questions

How much does a labour hire licence cost in Queensland?

It depends on the wages you paid supplied workers last financial year. The fee is $1,197.58 for under $1.5 million, $3,592.74 for $1.5 million to under $5 million, and $5,987.91 for $5 million and over. New businesses use projected wages. You pay the same amount at application, each annual renewal and restoration, and it is indexed every 1 July.

How long does a Queensland labour hire licence take to get?

The regulator says simple applications are normally decided within 28 business days once the application is lodged and the fee paid. Anything needing more information takes longer, and the timeline depends on you. Gather the viability pack and the fit and proper declarations before you open the portal, so the clock starts on a complete file.

Does a recruitment agency need a labour hire licence in Queensland?

Only if it supplies workers it pays. Permanent placement, where the candidate becomes the client's employee, is recruitment and sits outside the scheme. A temp or contract desk that employs the worker and invoices the client for the hours is labour hire. It needs the licence before the first placement, whatever the agency calls itself.

Does my Victorian or South Australian licence cover Queensland?

No. Queensland, Victoria, South Australia and the ACT each run a separate scheme with its own application, fee, register and reporting. The Queensland regulator will consider an interstate licence when assessing fitness and viability, but you still apply. Supplying workers in three licensing states means holding three licences. The South Australian scheme has its own page.

What happens if my Queensland labour hire licence expires?

If you applied for renewal before expiry, the licence continues until the regulator decides. If you did not, you have 28 days after expiry to apply for restoration and pay the restoration fee, which is the same amount as your tier's application fee. After that window the business is unlicensed, and every worker supplied from then on is an offence.

What is the penalty for using an unlicensed labour hire provider in Queensland?

The same as for providing unlicensed: up to 3,000 penalty units for a corporation, or 1,034 penalty units or three years imprisonment for an individual. A host has a reasonable excuse if the provider appeared on the public register as licensed when the arrangement was made. That is why a careful host checks the register before signing.

The next step isn't a sales call

This page gets two kinds of readers. One is racing a regulator. The other runs a temp desk inside someone else's agency, with 30 or 50 workers out. He has just read the viability list and thought: I could do every line of that. You could. You already do most of it. The labour hire licence was never the wall. What stands in the way is the payroll float, the insurance stack, WorkCover and collections. Staying behind it was smart. It isn't anymore.

That is what the working session is for. Bring your real numbers: workers out, weekly margin, the float you think you would need. Meet Cathy, who runs payroll, and Charlene, who handles WorkCover claims, and stress test us. Half the people who sit the session sign. The other half leave knowing exactly what their desk is worth under their own name. 100% your brand, yours to keep. We start four agencies a month. Nothing is public, ever.

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