doctorpay New Zealand doctor pay, from the agreements — not the agencies

Training / The pathway

House officer to consultant

What happens, in what order, and what you're paid at each stage. Category C (55–59.9 hours a week) is used for the resident-doctor figures because it is a common run; your own category will differ.

  1. Graduation

    Provisional general registration

    New Zealand and Australian graduates register in the provisional general scope to complete the intern year. Overseas graduates enter here too, by one of the registration pathways.

  2. PGY1 – PGY3

    House officer

    Rotating runs in a public hospital under the NZRDA or STONZ agreement. Three hours a week of protected teaching time. General registration after a satisfactory PGY1.

    $115,703 year 1 · $122,220 year 2 · $128,693 year 3 — category C, NZRDA
  3. Typically PGY3 onward

    Registrar

    Year 1 on appointment to a first registrar position. Advances a year at a time on 12 months' service. Not all registrar jobs are training jobs — a "non-training registrar" is paid on the same grid.

    $134,830 year 1 · $147,778 year 3 · $160,749 year 5 — category C, NZRDA
  4. Selection into a college programme

    Vocational training

    Each specialty has one prescribed Fellowship and one college. Programmes run roughly three to seven years full time. Every scope and its college →

    The bar: A Registrar does not progress beyond Year 5 unless they are in a training programme leading to vocational registration in New Zealand. On later acceptance into such a programme they move up a step if they have been on Year 5 for 12 months or more, and their anniversary resets.

  5. Part I exams passed

    The exam step, and "senior registrar" rates

    Progress one extra step in the scale. Once you have Part I and are on step 4 or higher in a training programme, extra shifts are paid at the senior registrar rate ($120/$180 an hour).

    $176,870 year 7 · $193,040 year 9 — category C, NZRDA
  6. Fellowship awarded

    Vocational registration

    With the prescribed Fellowship you apply for vocational registration (VOC1). Under the ASMS agreement, a doctor who has met the requirements for vocational registration is placed on the specialist scale before the paperwork lands. SECA cl. 12.2(g)(i)

  7. First consultant job

    Specialist (SMO)

    Placed by negotiation; one step a year to step 15. Six weeks' leave, ten days and $18,000 CME, time-and-a-half on-call, matched super to 6%, three months' sabbatical every six years.

    $198,386 step 1 · $240,516 step 8 · $282,645 step 15 — ASMS, from 6 July 2026
  8. Without a Fellowship

    Medical officer (MOSS)

    Senior doctors who stay non-vocational are placed on the 14-step medical officer scale — at the step matching their registrar years, or at least one above their old base. SECA cl. 12.2(g)(v)

    $152,694 step 1 · $222,476 step 14
General practice is a different route. GP trainees enter GPEP, usually from PGY2 or later, on a flat salary rather than the grid, and are self-employed or practice-employed from GPEP year 2. How GPEP works →

Source

Signed agreement, Health New Zealand · checked 3 September 2026

Online version published by NZRDA · checked 3 September 2026 — Salary tables agree digit-for-digit with the signed scan's OCR layer and with page images of pages 13, 14 and 16 of the signed PDF.

Signed agreement, Health New Zealand (searchable) · checked 18 September 2026 — Salary tables on pages 9 and 10 of the PDF checked against the page image digit for digit.