Wage underpayment headlines continue to put pressure on employers of all sizes, revealing how costly payroll mistakes can be for small and medium businesses. A recent Federal Court decision has tightened the rules on set-off, confirming that payroll errors must now be identified and fixed before employees are paid.

In this context, Yellow Canary, Australia’s leading provider of post-payroll compliance audits, has announced an exclusive partnership with Celery, the global leader in AI-driven pre-payroll review technology trusted by more than 5,000 companies worldwide.

Through the partnership, Yellow Canary becomes Celery’s sole Australian partner, bringing proven pre-payroll review capability to local employers for the first time and helping smaller businesses gain earlier, more affordable assurance over payroll accuracy.

Making payroll compliance simpler for SMEs

Australia’s pay framework is notoriously complex,even for smaller businesses. Errors often start well before payday, in rostering, classification, or allowance settings, and can be difficult and expensive to fix later.

By combining Yellow Canary’s insights from more than 110 large-scale payroll audits with Celery’s AI-driven review engine, the partnership gives SMEs a proactive, lower-cost way to identify and resolve issues before they become compliance problems.

“We’re excited to enter the Australian market through Yellow Canary,” said Yuval Brot, Chief Executive Officer at Celery. “Every market has its own complexity, but the goal is the same, supporting payroll accuracy through intelligent automation.”

“We’re tailoring this global technology to Australia’s unique pay landscape and giving organisations the confidence to fix issues before employees are paid,” said Marcus Zeltzer, Co-founder and Managing Director at Yellow Canary.
Development and localisation of Celery’s pre-payroll review technology for Australian SMEs and enterprise employers is now underway.

About Celery

Celery is an AI-driven oversight platform that helps finance teams catch costly errors before they impact the bottom line. Built for labour-intensive industries, Celery replaces manual complex reviews with intelligent audit agents that detect fraud, errors, compliance risks, and inefficiencies across payroll and revenue workflows.

About Yellow Canary

Yellow Canary is the leading provider of an automated, AI-powered compliance audit platform. Built for large employers and their partners, it detects, quantifies, and diagnoses payroll risks across pay, Modern Awards, enterprise agreements, superannuation, and long service leave.