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Tax Payment Deferrals

The ATO is providing SMEs payment deferral concessions for businesses directly impacted by COVD-19.

They are outlined as followed:

• Deferring by up to 4 months the payment date of amounts due through the business activity statement (including PAYG instalments), income tax assessments, fringe benefits tax assessments and excise.
• Allow businesses on a quarterly reporting cycle to opt into monthly GST reporting in order to get faster access to GST refunds they may be entitled to.

• Allowing businesses to vary Pay As You Go (PAYG) instalment amounts to zero for the March 2020 quarter. Businesses that vary their PAYG instalment to zero can also claim a refund for any instalments made for the September 2019 and December 2019 quarters.
• Remitting any interest and penalties, incurred on or after 23 January 2020, that have been applied to tax liabilities.
• Working with affected businesses to help them pay their existing and ongoing tax liabilities by allowing them to enter into low interest payment plans.

A couple of very important things to note:

• You will still need to pay Superannuation by the quarterly due dates
• These relief provisions are not automatically applied. You or your accountant will need to contact the ATO to make any of the above requests for assistance.

 More information from the ATO can be found here.