FILE REF: [FILE NO.]
TITLE:
Single Touch Payroll Working Groups meeting
VENUE:
DATE OF
MEETING:
Adina Apartments Hotel – 189 Queen Street Melbourne
Date: Tuesday 9 June 2015
Time: 10:00am to 5.30pm
Date: Wednesday 10 June 2015
Time: 9:00am to 3.30pm
CHAIR:
Martin Mane (ATO)
FACILITATOR:
Stephanie Lillywhite
CONTACT:
Kate French
CONTACT PHONE:
02 4923 1134
0439 422 952
NEXT MEETING:
TBA
Key Points
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Developers feel there is a need to align with the offerings coming from the Digital
Transformation Office (DTO) so the opportunity is not lost.
There is little value in the current retail onboarding to medium-large businesses (greater
value to small/micro). Many software developers would prefer to expand their existing
wholesale onboarding offering instead of catering for information submitted through
myGov.
There would be significant benefit in enabling the use of myGov credentials in the
wholesale onboarding solution to support prefill of employee data.
Current secrecy provisions restrict what can be done with taxpayer information.
There may be a need for pre-lodge validation for the payroll event.
There is ongoing discussion within the ATO about the messaging format to be used
however the solution to be built is format-agnostic. There is concern among software
developers that this is yet to be resolved.
Response times from the ATO will be affected during peak times.
It was agreed that, within a payroll event lodgment where the sum of employee forms
does not equal the data at the employer form level, the lodgment would be rejected.
Validations to be built into software.
There will be no need to deregister for W1/W2 as the first STP lodgment will cancel these
however need to work through what this means for different parts of a business
transitioning to STP at different times.
Employer’s Business Management System (BMS) will be the source of truth for employee
information (e.g. current details, super fund, PAYGW amounts).
CLASSIFICATION: UNCLASSIFIED
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The ATO will be employee’s source of truth for all STP payroll event information (e.g.
payment summary data from all employees).
There must be alignment with SuperStream where this is possible.
There is a preference to use the minimum number of reports to satisfy multiple reporting
obligations (i.e. should use SuperStream messages where possible).
It was agreed that the need to cater for amendments is required and it was acknowledged
that not all software products would enable this functionality.
There needs to be a robust process that employees can rely on in understanding their
payment summary information so that they can complete their tax returns. ATO and BMSheld data needs to be in sync.
For some developers, a resolution of the messaging format is required before progressing
any further and may prevent participation in a pilot.
Reference
Action item
Status update
2015/06.01
Provide a roadmap of known items of
change for the ATO to include future
potential STP scope, SuperStream
milestones, changes to myGov/ATO
Online etc.
In progress
2015/06.02
Advise who is liable where there is a
fraudulent log on to myGov and e.g.
Super Choice nomination is made to an
SMSF.
In progress
2015/06.03
Advise the electronic record keeping
requirements for TFN Dec.
In progress
2015/06.04
Advise whether there is any possible
situation where data changed by
employer will update ATO-held data –
formal response based on law required.
Completed
Advise the legal position on what action
is required where data goes to the wrong
employer.
Completed
Raise software developer community
In progress
2015/06.05
2015/06.06
CLASSIFICATION: UNCLASSIFIED
Seeking latest pack
developed for Board of
Taxation
The current design does
not support any situation
where the updating of
employee-related data by
an employer in their BMS
updates ATO-held
information about that
employee e.g. changing
their address/name etc.
There is no legal
requirement to retrieve
data that is sent to and
accepted by the incorrect
employer.
view with Treasury that greater value
can be provided to businesses with a
change in secrecy provisions. E.g. it
would provide greater value if, in
wholesale onboarding, employee
relationship with a particular superfund
could be validated.
View to change secrecy
provisions have been
raised with Treasury.
Awaiting feedback
Raise software developer community
view of benefit of broadening use of
myGov credential with DTO.
In progress
2015/06.08
Check whether specifics of offset details are
currently on variation forms
Completed
NAT 567-06.2014 form
reviewed and label 7 “Do you
want to increase the rate or
amount withheld from
payments made
to you” has been added to the
STP taxonomy
2015/06.09
Work through issues associated with
RFBA and bring options back to working
group.
In progress
Define what constitutes the need to
report to the ATO and advise working
group. Is it a withholding event? Would
Super contribution only be reported?
What if there is salary sacrifice amount
that impacts taxable income?
In progress
2015/06.07
2015/06.10
Discussions have
commenced within the
ATO to consider the user
experience and security.
Current view is that an
additional service will be
required to allow reporting
of RFBA amounts outside
of a normal payroll event.
The ATO aims to realise
an enhancement to
Australian payroll
accounting systems. New
technologies exist to
support frequent direct
reporting and tax
transparency between the
ATO and the employer
community. The STP
program intends to
establish a B2G reporting
requirement surrounding
the following liabilities:
1 – Employee PAYGW
liability derived from the
salary payments made by
CLASSIFICATION: UNCLASSIFIED
an entity to their staff
2 – ATO Super have
defined a requirement to
have also have both Super
entitlement information
reported to the ATO on
event basis.
3 – ATO Super further
intends to collect
confirmation of Super
payments from employers,
driven by the actual
payment event to a super
fund. The correlation
between items 2 and 3 will
support ATO Super to
define a policy around the
implementation of SGC.
4 – Further payroll items
that cannot be deemed
frequently by event basis
like RFBA and associated
Salary Sacrifice
calculations have been
drawn out from the
proposed STP payroll
event.
5 - A purpose built
independent service “STP
Payment Summary
Update” Event will need to
be developed to ensure
the capture of payroll
related information that
falls out of the norm.
2015/06.11
2015/06.12
Arrange meeting with software providers
who allow amendments to payroll events
e.g. where it is possible to
reverse/delete. Participants to be
identified by ABSIA.
In progress
Find out how many amended payment
summaries the ATO receives each year.
In progress
In 2014 there were 268,245
payment summaries
To be scheduled early in
new financial year.
amended by payers –
representing ~2%
CLASSIFICATION: UNCLASSIFIED
2015/06.13
Explore options for services that can be
provided to enable employers to
reconcile ATO- a range of organisations
are included.
CLASSIFICATION: UNCLASSIFIED
Completed
Functionality to enable
employers to reconcile
information held by the
ATO with that in their
software is currently being
designed.