Keep Up With The Changes To Payroll
We have written a length about the changes to payroll over the last months, Single Touch Payroll has been one of the bigger changes that are happening, but there are more!
Minimum Wage
The Minimum wage review was completed by the Fair Work Commission and the new rates are effective 1 July 2018, if you have any employees in this category, be sure to check the rates with Fair Work Commission. There are several different rates of pay to be considered here, dependant on the employee role, the role descriptions can also be found on the Fair Work Commission website.
Single Touch Payroll (STP)
The big one is Single Touch Payroll (STP) which is a change to the way employers report the employees’ tax and super information to the ATO. This change has resulted in businesses reviewing their payroll software to ensure that they are STP ready. When an employer runs their payroll or pays employees, they are required to send the employees tax and super information to the ATO directly via their software or a third party.
This was effective 1 July 2018 for employers with 20 or more employees.
The requirements for employers with 19 employees or less was not yet confirmed at the time of writing this article and is currently before parliament. To ensure your business is ready for the changes, you can contact us to help you implement a software solution that is both cost-effective for your small business and suited to facilitate the ATO requirements to report employee payroll and super.
Micro employers (1-4 employees) will also have a number of alternative options that are not available to employers with 20 or more employees – such as initially allowing your registered tax or BAS agent to report quarterly, rather than each time you run your payroll.
Exemptions to STP reporting will also be available if you have no internet or an unreliable connection.
Superannuation Contribution Cap
For employees, the Superannuation Contribution Cap has also been reviewed and from 1 July 2019, if your total superannuation balance is less than $500,000 at the end of 30 June of the previous financial year, you may be able to increase your concessional contributions cap. To do so you must have unused concessional contributions cap space for one or more of the previous five years, starting from 2018–19. The first time you will be required to know your total superannuation balance for the concessional contributions cap carry forward measure will be the 30 June 2019.
It is important to stay abreast of these issues and we continue to monitor legislative changes to provide the latest up to date information that may affect our clients and friends of Advivo. If you want to know more about any of these topics, contact us to discuss, we are here to help.
