What is Fringe Benefit Tax (FBT)?
A fringe benefit is a benefit provided in respect of employment. This effectively means a benefit provided to an employee (or their associate) because they are an employee.
An example of a fringe benefit being provided to an employee may be one of the following:
- Allowing your employees to use a work car for private purposes
- Giving your employee a cheap loan
- Reimbursing an expense incurred by your employee, such as school fees
- Providing entertainment by way of food, drink or recreation.
If you are a director and conduct your business through a company or a trust, you may be an employee of the company or trust. This may mean you are actually providing fringe benefits to yourself and so you need to understand your company’s or trust’s FBT obligations.
Types of Fringe Benefits
To clarify there are nine types of fringe benefits listed by the ATO as listed below:
- Car fringe benefits
- Car parking fringe benefits
- Entertainment fringe benefits
- Expense payment fringe benefits
- Loan fringe benefits
- Debt waiver fringe benefits
- Housing fringe benefits
- Board fringe benefits
- Living away from home allowance fringe benefits
How to Reduce Your FBT Payment
There are a few strategies to reduce the amount of FBT you (employer) pay, we have listed some below:
- Replacing fringe benefits with cash salary
- Providing benefits that your employees would be entitled to claim as an income tax deduction if they had paid for the benefits themselves (the ‘otherwise deductible’ rule);
- Providing benefits that are exempt from FBT, such as Electric Vehicles below the Luxury Car Threshold;
- Using employee contributions. Generally, this payment is a cash payment made to you or the person who provided the benefit. However, an employee can also make an employee contribution towards a car fringe benefit by paying for some of the operating costs (such as fuel) that you do not reimburse
Consult a Specialist Accountant
It is important to remember that you should always consult a specialist accountant when considering your options for reducing liability in your business. Given that The ATO usually don’t notify you of how much FBT you (employer) have to pay. Rather, you self-assess your FBT payable when you lodge your FBT return. The rate of FBT is levied on what is commonly referred to as the ‘grossed-up amount’.
Grossing-up means increasing the taxable value of benefits you provide to reflect the gross salary employees would have to earn at the highest marginal tax rate (including Medicare levy) to buy the benefits after paying tax.
If you need any tax or accounting advice, please call us today at ADVIVO on (07) 3226 1800, or use our contact form.
