The Australian pub sector has been put on notice by a government department.
The National Measurement Institute (NMI) – the peak body for maintaining Australia’s measurement system – has revealed it will be auditing Australian pubs to ensure compliance.
As part of a ‘blitz’, its ‘National Compliance Plan’ for 2019-20 “aims to instil confidence in consumers,” says the Minister for Industry, Science and Technology Karen Andrews.
“This program will focus on the sale of beer and prescribed spirits in licensed premises to ensure consumer are receiving correct measure,” the plan reveals.
The plan promises visits to 10,000 businesses, the testing of 10,000 measuring instruments and 1,000 secret shopper trial purchases.
The Institute is specifically targeting licensed premises along with major supermarkets, fuel retailers and others.
“We recognise that most businesses want to do the right thing,” says Andrews, “and will usually quickly correct any errors, but where we find severe or persistent offenders we can impose fines or initiate prosecutions.”
The NMI can issue infringement notices with fines of $1,050 per offence. If the case is serious enough to warrant prosecution, the maximum fines are $210,000 per offence as a company or $42,000 per offence as an individual.