Jobkeeper 2.0 – new eligibility and new rates

On 15 September 2020, the Treasury has released the Amendment Rules in relation to the Jobkeeper extension (Jobkeeper 2.0) that was legislated on 16 September 2020. The new extension rules will apply from 28 September 2020 onwards to 28 March 2021 and it will affect all Jobkeeper participants, including employees and business participants. 

In short: 

  • Businesses need to reassess their eligibility criteria from 28 September 2020 onwards in order to continue to qualify for Jobkeeper, and again on 4 January 2021. 
  • Payment rate will be reduced for both employees and business participants, and be split into tiers, depending on the number of hours worked 
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in Articles / Knowledge Base / News / Tax Advice and Planning  by Emily Yip

Trusts acquiring property in Victoria & New South Wales

If you have bought or are planning to buy residential property via a discretionary trust, you could be liable to pay more duty.  It all depends on what is in the trust deed.

Changes came into place on 1 March 2020 for trust structures acquiring residential property in Victoria or New South Wales.  These trusts will need to check the existing trust deeds which may need amending to exclude any potential foreign beneficiaries.

The changes occurred as the Victorian and New South Wales Offices of State Revenue (SRO and OSR) announced it was changing its stance on the application of duty surcharge to property owned or acquired by family trusts.  This could result in paying more tax.

So what does all that mean? 

Well most family or discretionary trusts do not specifically exclude potential foreign beneficiaries.  This can mean your trust will be a foreign trust for duty purposes resulting in an additional duty of 7% being applied to a property purchase.  This can mean extra tax of tens of thousands.

What to do?

Call us before purchasing property in Victoria or New South Wales if you are thinking about purchasing the property in your trust structure.  We can work with you to ensure your trust structure is the most appropriate structure to use and whether your deed should be amended.

in Articles / Rental Properties / Tax Advice and Planning  by Melissa de Largie

Want to minimise tax when selling your business?

Are you a business owner who is considering selling your business, but is unsure what the tax implications are?

When it comes to selling your business, there are many decisions to make, and sometimes these decisions may impact your tax liabilities on sale. It is therefore wise to speak to an expert about the road ahead before starting the journey of selling.

If a business is sold without having extensive analysis of its tax implications, you may end up having to pay up to 47% tax on the profit. However with proper consultation well before the sale, you may be able to reduce the income tax liability down (sometimes to nil!). The difference can be enormous when the profit is huge.

For example: a business sale with profit of $3m, with 47% tax, your share to keep is $1.59m, however with a 0% tax, you get to keep $3m. That’s a difference of $1.41m!

Below are some concessions you may be able to use to minimise your tax.

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in Articles / Capital Gains Tax / Knowledge Base / News / Running A Business / Self Managed Super Funds / Tax Advice and Planning  by Emily Yip

Mythbusting the tax accountant’s industry

The busy season is here, and we are meeting our clients everyday to help with preparing their tax returns, business and tax advisory and bookkeeping queries. Very often during our conversations they raise some interesting questions, let’s have a look at some of them here.

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in Articles / Knowledge Base / News / Personal Tax Returns / Tax Advice and Planning  by Emily Yip

Where is my PAYG Payment Summary?

It’s tax time and everybody is in a hurry to get their tax returns lodged for a nice little surprise refund from the new Low & Middle Income Tax Offset that has recently passed the Parliament and became law.

 

For those who worked as an employee in the 2019 financial year, you may notice that your employer did not provide you with a PAYG Summary (or Group Certificate). Before storming off to the payroll manager and questioning them, it is nice to know that the law has changed: Single Touch Payroll may now apply to your employer’s business. (What is Single Touch Payroll, or STP?)

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in Articles / News / Personal Tax Returns  by Emily Yip