Jerry* had been working at a small Sydney accounting firm for three years when he was suddenly made redundant.
The 28-year-old migrant worker from India, who has asked to go by a different name and who is on a student visa, waited for a redundancy payment that never arrived.
He then found out the firm had underpaid him more than $7,000 throughout the course of his employment, and was owed about $2,600 in severance payments.
"I was under the impression that students, visa holders, were not beholden to the minimum wage, [that] they can pay us what they wanted," Jerry said.
"But then when I researched and when I asked around, I was told no, minimum wage applied to everyone."
The Redfern Legal Centre, which helped Jerry recover the nearly $10,000 outstanding to him, said he was paid about 20 per cent below the national minimum wage.
Jerry said he was scared of his employer and did not want to raise the issue of pay, fearful that his employer would provide a bad reference to a future employer.
"I was very afraid of this employer because he has so much control over me. He's my only reference in my resume if I wanted to find next employment,"
Legal centre sees surge in requests for help
The Redfern Legal Centre said it had seen a more than 30 per cent increase in requests for assistance for employment law between 2023 and 2024.
Redfern Legal Centre senior solicitor Seri Feldman-Gubbay said the increase had been driven by a number of factors, including the cost of living.
"I think people are feeling the crunch of the economy, and a lot of people, particularly migrants … I guess are questioning the rates that they're receiving," Ms Feldman-Gubbay said.
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