The dates, plainly
People at Work, the free, government-backed psychosocial risk assessment survey, is being decommissioned. The timeline has three fixed points: final new registrations closed on 1 June 2026; the window to launch a last survey ended on 1 July 2026; and the platform closes entirely on 2 October 2026. There's no drama in any of that, but there is one deadline that matters: if your organisation has historic People at Work results, export them before October. Trend data against your own baseline is the most valuable thing a psychosocial survey produces, and it won't be retrievable afterwards.
One thing to know before you go looking for a copy of the questionnaire: People at Work's survey content is not reusable. Its terms restrict use of the instrument, so replacing the platform means replacing the instrument too, rather than pasting the same questions into a different tool.
What does not change
The duty People at Work supported doesn't retire with it. Under section 19 of the model WHS Act, a PCBU owes workers a primary duty of care, and regulations 55A–55D require psychosocial risks to be eliminated or, where that's not reasonably practicable, minimised. The approved Code of Practice on managing psychosocial hazards explicitly endorses anonymous worker surveys as a way of identifying hazards, and says medium and large organisations "should consider" using a validated psychosocial risk assessment process. What it never does is name an instrument. People at Work was one way to run an assessment; it was never the mandated way, and no replacement is either.
Victoria sits outside the model WHS laws, but its own psychosocial regulations, in force since December 2025, impose an equivalent obligation. Wherever you are in Australia, the practical position is the same: the tool is going away; the duty is not.
What to look for in a replacement
Whatever you choose, five things separate a replacement that discharges the duty well from one that just fills the gap on paper:
- Hazard coverage mapped to the Code's list of job demands, low control, poor support, lack of role clarity, poorly managed change, harmful behaviours and isolation, so results speak the same language as your risk register.
- Anonymity workers believe in. That means anonymous by design, not "anonymous" via a spreadsheet that visibly knows who they are. Honest answers are the entire point of the exercise.
- A repeatable cadence: assess, act, re-measure. A psychosocial risk assessment is a cycle, not a certificate, and the re-measure is what shows your controls worked.
- Results by team, with small-group privacy. Hazards are usually local (one team's workload, one site's conduct problem), so you need team-level results, held back below a minimum group size so no individual can be picked out.
- Sensible cost. You'll run this every year, indefinitely, so price it as a permanent line item rather than a one-off project.
The honest options
Three genuinely defensible routes exist, and which one fits depends on your size and risk profile:
- A consultancy-run assessment. Thorough, covering the instrument, the analysis and facilitated action planning, and priced accordingly. For complex or high-risk workplaces, or where leadership wants expert interpretation in the room, this is money well spent.
- DIY in a generic form builder. Free, but you're writing your own instrument, doing your own analysis, and asking workers to trust the anonymity of a tool that plainly knows who they are. It can be done; it's rarely done well twice.
- A dedicated anonymous survey tool with hazard-mapped templates. The self-serve middle: ready-made instruments, anonymity built in, team-level results, flat pricing.
Moodly Surveys sits in that third camp. Its Psychosocial Risk Check is an 11-question template mapped to the common hazard categories: demands, control, support, role clarity, change, conduct, isolation and work-life balance. For organisations that want a validated instrument, the HSE Management Standards Indicator Tool (the UK regulator's 35-item work-related stress survey, published under an open licence) is included too. To be plain about what that does and doesn't mean: neither instrument is endorsed by Safe Work Australia or any Australian regulator, and none has to be. The Code asks for a process that identifies hazards and supports action; the instrument is your choice.
What a survey does and doesn't do
The duty binds the PCBU, not the software. A survey is one recognised input into a psychosocial risk assessment: it tells you where the hazards are and whether last year's controls moved anything. Consulting your workers, deciding and implementing controls, and reviewing them remain yours; no tool does that part for you, including this one.