Jetstar Pay Rates 2026: Cabin Crew & Airport Staff Pay

Jetstar is the Qantas Group's low-cost airline, flying domestic, trans-Tasman and Asian routes with its own cabin crew, pilots, airport customer service and engineering staff. Cabin crew are employed through Jetstar and Qantas Group crewing entities, which is why several different agreements apply across the fleet.

Jetstar cabin crew sit on the Aircraft Cabin Crew Award 2020 and airport staff on the Airline Operations—Ground Staff Award, with Jetstar enterprise agreements above them (below). The cabin crew award ladder is tabled below; agreement pay is built from base rates plus flying allowances that the award does not capture.

The federal awards relevant to Jetstar roles:

• Aircraft Cabin Crew Award 2020 (MA000047)
• Airline Operations—Ground Staff Award 2020 (MA000048)

Workforce snapshot. In the 2024-25 Workplace Gender Equality Agency reports, Jetstar Airways Pty Limited, Jetstar Group Pty Ltd reported 4,717 employees (part of the Qantas Airways Limited group, 25,017 employees in total, 0.2% casual and 44.1% women). Source: WGEA 2025 Public Data File, data.gov.au (CC-BY 3.0 AU).

Flight attendants sit on the Aircraft Cabin Crew Award 2020 (MA000047):

Cabin crew pay under an agreement is built from a base salary plus flying, overnight and meal allowances that the award floor does not capture — the agreement document is the source for those.

Source: Fair Work Commission modern awards pay database, current-operative rates (1 July 2026 annual wage review). Casual figures add the 25% casual loading.

Ramp, baggage and aircraft-servicing staff sit on the Airline Operations—Ground Staff Award 2020 (MA000048):

Airport rosters run around the clock — the award's shift, weekend and public holiday loadings and its minimum-engagement rules are where most ground-crew pay disputes sit.

Source: Fair Work Commission modern awards pay database, current-operative rates (1 July 2026 annual wage review). Casual figures add the 25% casual loading.

Enterprise agreements set rates above the award, with their own classification structures and allowances. Current Jetstar agreements in our corpus (4 in total):

• Jetstar Airways Engineering & Maintenance Enterprise Agreement 2023 — approved April 2023, nominal expiry 31 December 2026.
• Jetstar Airways Cabin Crew Agreement 2022 — approved June 2023, nominal expiry 30 April 2026.
• JETSTAR / ASU AGREEMENT 2023 — approved May 2023, nominal expiry 31 March 2026.
• JETSTAR AIRWAYS CABIN CREW (WIDEBODY) AGREEMENT 2023 — approved June 2023, nominal expiry 30 September 2025.

We don't reproduce agreement dollar figures here — the agreement covering your site, state and stream is the document to read. Find your agreement, then your classification, then your pay point, and compare it with your payslip. The award tables on this page are the floor every one of these agreements must beat.

General award-compliance issues that come up across the aviation sector. This is a checklist for your own payslip, not a finding about Jetstar:

• Agreement pay grades not applied after a transfer of business or franchise change.
• Rostering and shift-change penalties under the agreement missed on short-notice changes.
• Unpaid sign-on, handover and travel at the start and end of shifts.
• Allowances (meal, travel, relieving) dropped when payroll systems change.

Match your payslip to your classification in the agreement (or the award tables above), and price any gap with our back-pay calculator. Raise it in writing with payroll or your manager first — most underpayments are fixed at that step. Unresolved, the Fair Work Ombudsman (13 13 94) recovers underpayments at no cost, up to six years back, and your union can run the claim for you. Not sure which instrument covers you? Ask our AI advisor with your role and location.