0:02

A listener production. Hi,

0:08

Sasha Barbagat with you. Welcome to the briefing.

0:11

It is nearly the end of the

0:13

financial year, and that means tax time.

0:15

This year, the ATO has been really

0:17

upfront about what its red flags will

0:20

be and how in particular

0:22

it's cracking down on anyone claiming

0:24

work from home expenses. The

0:26

ATO has incredible data matching and machine

0:28

learning going on in the background of

0:31

what they do. So they benchmark everybody

0:33

in the same age,

0:35

the same location, the same occupation. Everyone's

0:38

kind of benchmarked against each other. You're

0:40

not going to want to miss this episode of the briefing.

0:42

If you want to maximise the dollars you get back in

0:44

your bank account, or even just

0:46

avoid getting in trouble for accidentally claiming

0:48

the wrong thing. Everything you

0:50

need to know before you lodge your return, that

0:53

is coming up. But first, Helen Smith is here

0:55

with the headlines. It is Monday, the 24th of

0:57

June. Morning,

1:01

Sash. The federal government will force

1:03

the big supermarkets to adhere to

1:05

a code of conduct with hefty

1:07

fines for breaches. In a

1:10

move that has been anticipated for

1:12

months, Labour will today confirm it

1:14

is adopting all recommendations set out

1:16

in a review by former Minister

1:18

Craig Emerson. The legislation will

1:20

include massive fines that could be

1:22

as much as 10% of turnover,

1:26

given the annual sales revenues of Coles

1:28

and Woolworths is over $40 billion,

1:31

that could see penalties worth billions. Yeah,

1:33

the code will apply to all supermarkets

1:35

operating in Australia with an annual profit

1:38

of $5 billion or more. Right

1:41

now, that would include Coles, Woolies,

1:43

Aldi, and Metcash, which runs IGA.

1:45

But that could also expand to

1:47

include Costco and Amazon, if Amazon

1:49

ever does grocery deliveries in

1:52

Australia like it does in the US. And

1:54

look, one of the big focuses of the

1:56

review has been on how the grocery giants

1:59

deal with suppliers... who have

2:01

reported they fear retribution if they

2:03

speak up about unfair deals. It's

2:06

worth noting, Helen, this code of conduct

2:08

that's already existence was drawn up by

2:10

the supermarkets themselves 10 years ago, but

2:13

they don't have to follow it. It's

2:15

not enforced in any way. That is

2:17

what this review has recommended,

2:19

that they make it mandatory and that they

2:21

make all the supermarkets follow it. In

2:24

terms of how long, like

2:26

what a timeline might look like, so

2:29

making the code of conduct mandatory won't be

2:31

difficult. The harder part is going to be

2:33

the penalties for breaches, which as you said,

2:36

would be in the billions of dollars or

2:38

could be in the billions of dollars. They

2:41

will require legislation that will have

2:43

to change the Competition and Consumer

2:45

Act. Now whether this

2:48

will have support, the coalition

2:50

has previously indicated it might

2:52

support a mandatory code, but

2:54

Peter Dutton also called the review by Craig

2:57

Emerson, a Mickey Mouse review that has been

2:59

conducted by Labor, and also

3:01

questioned whether it will result in a reduction

3:03

in prices, which is what we the

3:05

people want. We want cheaper groceries. We don't want

3:07

to be ripped off when we're doing our weekly

3:10

shop. Separate work is happening

3:12

on prices. The government has also

3:14

commissioned quarterly monitoring of how much

3:16

we're paying at the grocery stores.

3:19

That first report dropped last week, finding Aldi

3:21

had cheaper groceries by about 25%. Lots

3:25

of stuff happening in groceries. There are,

3:27

and this is why I love Aldi. Days

3:31

after the coalition revealed its plan

3:33

for nuclear power in Australia, a

3:35

new poll is out showing voters

3:37

are pretty split on whether it's

3:39

a good one. The Resolve

3:42

political monitor conducted for nine newspapers

3:44

surveyed just over a thousand people

3:46

finding 41% back it and 37

3:48

are against the move. 22%

3:53

of respondents said they hadn't made up

3:55

their mind yet, indicating both sides could

3:57

gain ground in polling on the issue.

4:00

And over the weekend, the Smart

4:02

Energy Council released figures claiming Peter

4:05

Dutton's plan to build seven nuclear

4:07

reactors across five states would cost

4:09

at least $116 billion and

4:13

possibly as much as $600 billion.

4:17

Now Dutton says it will be cheaper

4:19

than Labor's renewable plan though. And

4:21

the Libs and Nats are still refusing to reveal how

4:24

much it will cost and that is going to be

4:26

the bugbear of the government as

4:28

it tries to convince people not to

4:30

back Peter Dutton's nuclear plan.

4:33

Dutton himself said he's happy for the

4:35

election to be a referendum on nuclear.

4:37

So this is going to be the

4:39

big issue over the next 12 months

4:41

as we slowly march towards another vote.

4:43

Look, also over the weekend, we heard

4:45

from former PM Paul Keating who was

4:47

extremely scathing, unsurprisingly, of Peter

4:49

Dutton's plan. He labelled him a charlatan

4:51

and a climate change denialist. Now I

4:54

found that interesting because there's a report

4:56

out that surveyed a bunch of

4:59

countries right around the world in

5:01

how they feel about climate change, which

5:03

seems insane that we're still doing that

5:05

these days. It found

5:07

that Australia is one of the most skeptical nations in

5:09

the world when it comes to climate change. 60%

5:12

believe it's human caused and that the

5:15

cost of addressing it through renewables is

5:17

worth it full stop. And that is

5:19

down 6%. The global average is

5:21

73%. So

5:23

we are really far behind in

5:25

terms of what the rest of the world's attitude

5:28

is towards climate change and how to address it.

5:30

So I found that an interesting one off

5:32

the back of Paul Keating's comments. A

5:35

major shopping centre in Adelaide went into

5:38

lockdown for over two hours yesterday afternoon

5:40

after a brawl broke out between two

5:42

groups of teenagers. South Australia

5:44

Police Assistant Commissioner Scott Duvall

5:47

said Marion Shopping Centre's management

5:49

issued an evacuation alarm. Under

5:51

reports, some of the group had

5:54

weapons, including expandable batons. The

5:56

expandable batons are seen and

5:58

at this stage we can't discount. any other

6:00

weapons but we do have some reports

6:02

that a knife may be involved. Duval also

6:04

said it appears the teens were known to

6:07

each other and it was not a random

6:09

attack but further investigations are underway. The boys

6:11

fled the scene and haven't been found yet.

6:13

In terms of injuries, a woman

6:16

in her 70s did cop a fracture

6:18

during the evacuation process. Another person was

6:20

treated for a non-life threatening injury and

6:22

the shopping centre is going to reopen

6:24

as normal today. Helen, I can imagine

6:26

a big part of the

6:28

fear of this, Bondi, the stabbing

6:31

at the Sydney Westfield, was

6:33

only in April and you know similar

6:35

scenes where there's evacuation alarms going and

6:37

people are running in fear, it'd be really

6:40

scary. Yeah it would have been really

6:42

scary and I saw some videos online

6:44

that people posted that were there and

6:46

I grew up in Adelaide. This shopping

6:48

centre is probably one of the biggest

6:50

ones we have and it's quite similar

6:52

to Bondi junction on those

6:54

grounds but yeah there was

6:56

some reports shoppers that were in the

6:58

cinemas were quite scared after other

7:00

shoppers were coming in and yelling and telling

7:03

them to evacuate and I mean if you're

7:05

in the middle of a movie and that

7:07

happens it's quite scary and the shoppers

7:10

did say to the media that

7:12

they were hiding behind seats some people ran

7:14

to emergency exits as the alarms were going

7:17

off. So yeah it is

7:19

quite a scary experience but yeah as you

7:21

said thankfully no one was really injured so

7:23

that is good. And

7:26

the 64th TV week Logie

7:28

nominations have been announced with

7:30

some exciting new talent making

7:32

the mix. So the

7:35

nominees for the biggest prize

7:37

of the night the Gold

7:39

Logie Award for the most

7:41

popular personality on Australian television.

7:43

The list includes Andy Lee,

7:46

Asha Kettie, Julia Morris, Larry

7:48

Emda, Sonya Kruger, Tony Armstrong

7:50

and newcomer Robert Irwin. So

7:53

the award ceremony will be broadcasted

7:55

on Sunday August the 18th and

7:58

you can cast your vote online. leading

8:00

up to that. Now, I

8:02

am really excited as well for

8:04

one of my favourite noms is Boy

8:07

Swallows Universe, which has been nominated for

8:09

a few acting awards with their leads

8:11

and also for Best Mini Series. What

8:14

are you looking forward to? Oh, Best

8:16

Competition Reality Program because I'm a

8:18

huge Survivor fan and Australian

8:21

Survivor, the most recent season, Titans vs Rebels

8:23

has been nominated. I saw as well Alone

8:25

Australia, which I know you really like. Yes,

8:27

I love Alone. I've got to get into

8:29

Alone. I haven't watched it yet. I

8:32

liked with the Gold Logie, so Hamish

8:34

and Andy, obviously, they're listener

8:36

podcasters, their podcast is absolutely

8:39

huge, constantly at number one. Number one

8:41

on the charts. Always, always beating us.

8:43

How dare they? But Hamish

8:45

is constantly nominated, but Andy's finally got

8:47

a nod, which is so exciting for

8:49

him. Yeah, I was so excited

8:52

to see that. And I was also excited to

8:54

see Tony Armstrong and Robert Irwin now had some

8:56

mixed thoughts about Robert because I was like, he's

8:58

pretty new on the scene, but you

9:01

can't not love him at the same time.

9:03

So, yeah, I don't know. I'm

9:05

not sure who I want to win, the Gold

9:07

Nom. It'd be nice to see

9:09

Larry take it out. Larry's been around for

9:11

a very long time, so I'm going to

9:13

get behind Larry Emder. Why not? Hey, Helen,

9:15

thanks so much for being here for the

9:17

headlines. Next up, it's our deep dive, looking

9:20

at tax time, what you need to know

9:22

before you launch your return. Hey,

9:33

Katrina, here with you. For a lot

9:35

of us, tax seems to be a

9:37

secret language that only the super savvy

9:39

or the very rich can understand, especially

9:42

when you see the figures like in

9:44

the latest data released by the tax

9:46

office that in the 21-22 financial year,

9:50

more than 100 Australians earned

9:52

more than $1 million in

9:54

total income yet paid. No

9:57

tax, nothing. That doesn't seem fair at

9:59

all. what do they know that we

10:01

don't? And what are the red flags

10:03

the ATO is going to be cracking

10:05

down on this year? You

10:07

might want to open up the notes section

10:09

on your phone while you listen to this briefing

10:12

because hopefully there'll be a few hacks you

10:14

can put to use while you're doing your tax

10:16

return this year that could actually save

10:18

you some money. Ashley Debenham

10:20

is from eTax Accountants and

10:23

joins us now. Ashley,

10:25

let's start with what the ATO has told us

10:27

they're going to be cracking down on this year.

10:29

We know that claiming for work from home

10:31

expenses can be really beneficial. A lot of

10:33

us are doing that. But where

10:35

do we need to be careful? Yeah, so the

10:37

main thing with work from home that is

10:40

that the ATO changed about 12 months ago

10:42

was they tightened the rules for record keeping.

10:44

So while they said, yeah, it's all good,

10:46

we're upping the rate to 67 cents per

10:48

hour, what kind of got lost in the

10:51

noise there was that now instead of being

10:53

able to have a four-week diary that kind

10:55

of showed a pattern of use, which is

10:57

how you used to do it, you now

10:59

have to have a record of every hour

11:02

that you work from home during the year

11:04

if you want to claim that 67 cents.

11:06

So people

11:08

are getting caught out because they come to

11:10

tax time and they realise, well, I don't

11:12

have a record of what I was doing

11:15

working from home 11 months ago and it

11:17

makes it much more difficult to claim work

11:19

from home correctly. Yeah, that seems

11:21

so onerous and almost impossible to

11:23

claim for that stuff. Yeah,

11:26

look, you can read between the lines of why the

11:28

ATO did it. I guess through the COVID

11:30

boom, they went from maybe a million people were

11:32

kind of claiming some sort of work from home

11:34

and I think last year it was about 4

11:37

million people. So it's obviously putting a bit of

11:39

a strain on the revenue

11:41

at the ATO and so they've made the record

11:43

keeping a bit tighter, I think, just to, I

11:46

guess, put a little bit more money in their coffers,

11:48

I suppose. One tip I do

11:50

have is if you get

11:52

to this point of the year and you realise you

11:55

don't have a record

11:57

of every hour of every day you work from home,

11:59

you can probably... have a chat with your

12:01

employer. A lot of employers will have time shooting

12:03

or payroll software that distinguish between

12:05

when you worked from home, when you didn't work from

12:07

home and they might be able to actually run a

12:09

report for you. Now asking for a

12:12

friend, I also read

12:14

that if you cut and paste

12:16

your expenses from last year, that

12:18

could be a red flag for

12:20

the ATO as well. Yes,

12:22

definitely. The ATO has incredible data

12:24

matching and machine learning going on

12:27

in the background of what they

12:29

do. So they benchmark everybody in

12:31

the same age, the same location,

12:33

the same occupation. Everyone's going

12:35

to benchmark against each other and copying

12:38

and pasting from last year is another way that

12:40

you're going to kind of set off an alarm

12:42

bell at the ATO and they might want to

12:44

pay a little bit closer attention, particularly with something

12:46

like work from home. I definitely think

12:48

you should steer clear of doing a copy and

12:50

paste job. Good advice. Ashley,

12:53

I read some really interesting

12:55

research done by Finder that

12:57

said that there

12:59

was a real generational difference

13:02

between boomers and millennials

13:04

in terms of how

13:06

much risk I suppose they're prepared to

13:09

take on when they're filing their tax

13:11

return. Apparently boomers don't ever lie on

13:13

their tax returns or rarely, but millennials

13:15

one in 10 feel comfortable telling a

13:18

porky to the ATO. Have you come

13:20

across this and why do you think this is? I

13:23

would say that the younger generation are perhaps a little

13:25

bit more or less risk averse

13:27

to the boomers. And

13:29

we do see at ETAC, we

13:31

will see kind of people potentially,

13:33

I guess, pushing the envelope. But

13:35

look, honestly, I wouldn't be if

13:37

I was a young person looking

13:39

to push the envelope, you would

13:41

also need to make sure you could back up

13:43

whatever you're claiming. The ATO is getting smarter and

13:45

smarter each year with how

13:47

they can identify people who are making

13:50

incorrect claims. And if the ATO

13:52

did flag you and you couldn't back up what you

13:54

were claiming, then not only would you have to pay

13:56

back whatever extra refund they gave you, but if they

13:58

think you've done it in the then they

14:00

can also impose fines as well. Yeah,

14:03

speaking of the rules, I feel

14:05

like with tax, there are all

14:07

of these kind of secret rules

14:09

that perhaps the everyday person doesn't

14:11

know about. And that's borne out

14:13

for me when I see the

14:15

data that I was referring to

14:17

earlier about all these millionaires who

14:20

are paying no tax. Like what

14:22

did they know that we don't

14:24

know? I think probably they

14:26

have far more complicated, I

14:29

guess financial affairs than the everyday person,

14:31

which means the more complicated your affairs

14:33

are, the more that these kind of

14:35

rich people can undertake. I

14:38

would call it legal tax avoidance. And

14:40

there's a big industry for some top

14:42

end of town accounting firms who kind

14:44

of help people do that. And it

14:46

usually comes down to whether they have

14:49

multiple sources of income, that

14:51

they also have businesses as

14:53

well as personal income. And

14:55

it allows them

14:57

to kind of shift money around

15:00

where to balance out

15:02

profit and loss, I suppose. It's the same

15:04

way that kind of these large corporations that

15:06

we kind of hear the big, what is

15:08

it, the big hundred companies in Australia, about

15:11

half of them pay no tax either. And

15:13

it's the same way where wherever they're making

15:15

all the money, they then use shift the

15:17

money around and use deductions to offset all

15:20

of that money. And it basically reduces their

15:22

tax bills down to very small amounts or

15:24

to zero. And whether

15:26

it's donations to charity, whether

15:28

it's kind of money in

15:31

a company where they're writing off company expenses

15:33

against the income that's coming in, there's

15:35

all sorts of dark arts, I suppose, to

15:38

tax avoidance that's available to people with complicated

15:40

affairs that everyday men like you and I

15:43

don't have access to, unfortunately. All

15:45

right, so what's something easy that

15:47

most people don't claim for, or

15:49

don't know that they can claim

15:52

for? I would say one

15:54

thing we see all the time at ETACs is

15:57

people forget to sweat the small stuff. What

16:00

I mean by that is you make a

16:02

work-related purchase, I don't know,

16:05

in August. It's $30 and

16:07

you don't think anything of it, you move

16:09

on. That really

16:11

adds up over the years. If you do that

16:13

every couple of weeks, you do that across the

16:15

course of a year, that's maybe $500 or $1,000

16:18

worth of deductions that you're missing out on come

16:20

tax time. We always say, snap a

16:22

photo of the receipt as soon as you get it, even if

16:24

it's only $30, stick it in a

16:26

folder on your phone, and then at tax time, you might

16:28

have another $200 sitting there ready

16:30

to go. Other really common

16:32

ones that I see people forgetting

16:35

are if you use a tax agent,

16:37

any fee you pay them is tax

16:39

deductible the following year. People

16:41

often forget that if they, in July this year, pay

16:43

$100, $200 to have their tax return

16:46

done, that's a deduction for next year. Don't

16:49

forget about it and pop it on your return next year. Other

16:52

things like union fees, membership fees,

16:54

a lot of professionals now are

16:56

part of industry bodies. If

16:59

tradies or teachers or nurses are all part

17:01

of a union or a membership, a lot

17:04

of them have to pay membership fees to be a

17:07

teacher or a nurse or a doctor. Every

17:09

single one of those fees you pay, it's

17:11

work-related. I work outside

17:13

as a reporter. Can I

17:15

claim for stuff like sunscreen

17:17

and sunglasses? Yes,

17:20

that's another common one. People

17:22

misunderstand how, I guess they're called sun protection

17:24

expenses is the broad term for them. If

17:27

you work outside, it's not just reserved for,

17:29

say, a tradie who's working outside on a

17:32

building side. If you're, like you said, you're

17:34

out hitting the beat, you're doing some reporting.

17:36

If you need sunglasses to protect your eyes,

17:39

if you need sun cream, that's all deductible.

17:41

If you buy a hat to protect your

17:43

head, then that's also deductible. The same goes

17:45

for people who are on the

17:48

road driving all the time. If you have

17:50

to drive as part of your job from

17:52

workplace to workplace or if you're a salesman

17:54

who's on the road, again, if you need

17:56

to buy sunglasses to protect your eyes, those

17:59

things are work-related. expenses as well. The

18:01

only caveat there is if

18:03

they are work and personal, the ATO

18:05

will expect you to apportion any

18:07

personal usage out of it. So if you

18:09

can keep anything work related separate, then you

18:12

can just claim it at 100%. But if

18:15

you do wear the sunglasses on

18:17

the weekend or whatever, then the ATO

18:19

would expect you to do some sort

18:21

of maths to split work and personal

18:23

use up. Does the ATO kind

18:25

of go, oh, you're really like, you

18:28

know, just taking it too far by

18:30

claiming these $300 Gucci glasses?

18:33

Or does it have to be a $20 pair

18:35

from the servo? It's a bit of a

18:37

fine line. And it's a gray area, that

18:39

one, it's kind of we've seen that with

18:41

a common one that's kind of related to

18:43

that handbags and briefcases, because again, people didn't

18:45

never used to realize that you could claim

18:47

a suitcase or a handbag, especially now with

18:50

people doing the hybrid work from home work

18:52

from the office, they have to cut their

18:54

laptop backwards and forwards. But if

18:56

you're going out and buying a Louis Vuitton bag for $1,000, it

18:58

might raise some

19:00

flags with the ATO as to why you needed that $1,000

19:02

bag as opposed to a $100 bag.

19:06

And the same would go with sunglasses. But

19:08

there is a bit of leniency there from the

19:10

ATO. The main thing is that you can show

19:12

that it was definitely required for your work, and

19:15

that you have evidence to support

19:17

like a receipt or whatnot

19:19

to support the claim you're making. You need to make

19:22

sure all your ducks are in a row. So

19:24

finally, what are the top tips you can leave

19:26

us with that we should all be thinking about

19:28

this tax time? I would say

19:31

don't get sucked into end of financial

19:33

year sales. They're everywhere at the moment

19:35

with retailers saying now make your tax

19:37

time purchases, blah, blah, blah. Keep

19:39

in mind that any purchase you make that's over $300, your depreciation

19:43

rules will apply. So if you go and buy

19:45

that $3,000 computer or the

19:47

$1,000 drill today, you

19:50

will only get nine days worth

19:52

of depreciation on your tax return next year.

19:54

So I was running the numbers yesterday and

19:56

someone who buys a $2,500 computer that

20:00

today will get $30 of that back in

20:02

their tax return as part of their tax

20:05

refund this year, because the

20:07

ATO makes you claim the computer over the whole

20:09

life of the computer, which is for the next

20:12

two years. So you'll get a big claim in

20:14

your next tax return, but if you're

20:16

falling for a retailer who's saying, buy

20:18

it now and claim your tax deduction, you might

20:20

be in for a bit of a rude shock

20:22

when the time comes to do your tax return.

20:25

That is an epic tip, by the way. And

20:27

tax cuts are coming in on the 1st of

20:29

July. So that means most of us are going,

20:32

our tax rates are gonna go down. So if

20:34

you do have any kind of

20:36

purchases you need to make that are work-related

20:39

now, make them before the

20:41

30th of June because you will get

20:44

a bigger deduction claiming it this year

20:46

than you will next year. So somebody

20:48

who's on a 37% tax bracket will

20:50

get, this is effectively 37% of the

20:52

purchase back this year. But

20:54

if they made that purchase in July, that

20:57

tax deduction will drop to 30% because their

20:59

tax bracket's gonna drop to 30%. Oh,

21:02

Ashley, you've given us so much to think about.

21:04

Thank you so much for your time and joining

21:06

us on the briefing. Thank you for having me. That

21:09

was Ashley Debenham from eTax Accountants. Thanks

21:11

so much for listening to this episode

21:14

of The Briefing. That is all from

21:16

us for now. Before you go though,

21:18

we would love it if you could

21:20

share this episode with someone you think

21:23

might enjoy it or maybe,

21:25

you know, someone who's struggling

21:27

with their tax return this

21:29

year. And a reminder, we

21:31

put our full episodes of

21:33

our weekend briefing chats on

21:35

YouTube, search listener newsroom to

21:37

see them. This episode

21:39

is about the future of our

21:42

business. Listener.