A group of foreign workers were forced to sleep on a Melbourne office floor for almost a month after their employer put a freeze on wages, renewing concerns of widespread rorting of the 457 visa scheme.

Eleven Filipino workers employed on temporary visas turned Schneider Elevators Australasia's head office into their makeshift living quarters because they could not afford lodging when their pay suddenly stopped six weeks ago.

Filipino workers living in a South Melbourne office.

Workplace photographs taken by the Australian Manufacturing Workers' Union show blow-up mattresses and couch cushions strewn across the floor of the South Melbourne office and employees sleeping among bags of their belongings.

The union's assistant state secretary, Craig Kelly, said the elevator company had failed to pay correct wages and overtime rates to its 17 workers – including 11 Filipinos, five Australians and a British national – and owed them more than $170,000.