Fast-tracking tax cuts for small and medium businesses The Government has fast-tracked the already legislated tax cuts to small and medium businesses by bringing them forward five years. Companies with an aggregated turnover of less than $50 million will have [...]
Christmas gifts With the holiday season approaching, many employers and businesses want to reward their staff and loyal clients/customers/suppliers. Again, it is important to understand how gifts to staff and clients, etc., are handled 'tax-wise'. Gifts that are not considered [...]
Scammers impersonating tax agents The ATO has received increasing reports of a new take on the ‘fake tax debt’ scam, whereby scammers are now impersonating registered tax agents to lend legitimacy to their phone call. The fraudsters do this by [...]
Increase in Private Health Insurance excesses Legislation has been passed by Parliament to implement the Private Health Insurance (‘PHI’) reforms announced by the Government in October 2017. The measures are designed to simplify PHI and make it more affordable for [...]
Increased scrutiny of home office claims Last year, 6.7 million taxpayers claimed a record $7.9 billion in deductions for ‘other work-related expenses’, which includes home office expenses. Reportedly, due to a high number of mistakes, errors and questionable claims for [...]
Suburban scammers pushing illegal early access to super The ATO has become aware of people in some suburban areas of major cities attempting to encourage others to illegally access their super early (generally for a fee) to help them to [...]
ATO guide to the 5 most common Tax Time mistakes As Tax Time 2018 has 'kicked off', the ATO has profiled the five most common mistakes they see, including taxpayers who are: leaving out some of their income (e.g., forgetting [...]
Super guarantee payable on ‘public holidays’ and ‘additional hours’! The Federal Court has held that superannuation guarantee contributions were payable with respect to the ‘additional hours’ and ‘public holidays’ component of annualised salaries paid by BlueScope Steel, on the basis [...]
New superannuation rates and thresholds released The ATO has published the key superannuation rates and thresholds for the 2018/19 income year. The Non-Concessional Contributions cap will remain at $100,000 (although transitional arrangements may apply), and the Concessional Contributions cap will [...]
ATO warning regarding small business record-keeping According to the ATO, of all of the things that can cause small businesses to fold, "high on that list is poor record keeping". More than half of the businesses they visited in their [...]