From Complexity to Clarity: Digitising Australia’s Wage System with MARS 

The Fair Work Commission (FWC) replaced its outdated Modern Awards Pay Database (MAPD) with a new system called Modern Awards and Rates System (MARS). Developed by Exco Partners using Microsoft Dynamics 365 and Azure, MARS is a low-code, scalable platform designed to streamline award management, reduce operational risk, and enable business users to manage complex pay data independently. The transformation significantly enhanced processing speed, data accuracy, and user autonomy, supporting FWC’s broader digital strategy and improving compliance and efficiency in managing over 70,000 pay rates across 155 modern awards.