In a bid to tackle non-payment of employee superannuation, the Minister for Revenue and Financial Services announced the beginning of a 12-month Superannuation Guarantee Amnesty (the Amnesty) on 24 May 2018.
The Amnesty provides employers with a one-off chance to self-correct past super guarantee (SG) non-compliance without incurring a penalty and is available until 23 May 2019 (subject to the passage of legislation).
Employers who take advantage of the Amnesty will avoid:
penalties and charges that may apply to late payments;
and are entitled to deductions for catch-up payments made during the Amnesty period to the employee’s regulated super fund or to the ATO (should employers require a payment plan).
To make use of the Amnesty, employers must:
voluntarily admit the amounts of prior SG shortfalls including nominal interest during the Amnesty period;
and not be the subject of an audit for SG for the relevant periods.
The ATO is encouraging employers to pay their SG shortfall amounts in full, including the nominal interest straight into the employee’s super fund.
Failure to either remain current with SG payment duties or declare SG shortfalls in this period could result in higher penalties later on.
There is a number of changes to the 2017-18 Self-managed super fund annual return (SAR) thanks to the super changes which came into effect on 1 July 2017.
Transition to retirement income stream (TRIS) account The ATO has included a new label for the number of TRIS accounts an SMSF member has in accumulation phase.
A TRIS account is in accumulation phase unless the SMSF member has reached 65 years of age or has met another ‘nil’ cashing restriction condition of release (i.e., permanent incapacity, retirement or a terminal medical condition) and has advised their fund.
Limited recourse borrowing arrangements (LRBA) New questions focused on the use of LRBAs and extra borrowings have been added to section H, items 15e and 16. SMSFs that hold assets under LRBAs will be required to complete these questions.
Correct calculation of a member’s total superannuation balance (TSB) New labels to allow the make-up of the ‘closing account balance’ to be reported to support a more efficient calculation of a member’s TSB have been added.
The member’s TSB may affect their non-concessional contributions cap as well as other super caps from 30 June 2017.
Cessation of the temporary budget repair levy Certain tax rates for superannuation entities have been reduced in line with the cessation of the temporary budget repair levy (payable by some individuals for 2014-15, 2015-16 and 2016-17).
These rates affected those individuals that applied to the taxable income of non-complying superannuation funds (47 per cent to 45 per cent) as well as the non-arm’s length component of the taxable income of a super fund (47 per cent to 45 per cent).
CGT relief A new label has been added to the capital gains tax (CGT) schedule for the purpose of reporting deferred notional gains where the gain has been realised.
Early stage venture capital limited partnership tax offset The ATO has added a new label to enable SMSFs to report the amount of unused early stage venture capital tax offset carried forward from the previous year.
