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Records for claiming work-related expenses When completing your tax return, you’re entitled to claim deductions for some expenses, most of which are directly related to earning your income. To successfully claim a deduction for work-related expenses, it’s important that you must have spent the money yourself and weren’t reimbursed, it must be directly related to…

Car parking fees incurred in the course of producing assessable income are generally deductible, but special rules apply if the car is used by an employee to commute between home and work or the car is provided to the employee by the employer. Non-employees Self-employed persons, partnerships or trusts are entitled to claim deductions for…

The ATO can issue public rulings that provide guidance on the interpretation of various tax laws. Public rulings generally deal with priority issues that have been found to require clarification, so if you have a concern about a particular area of tax law, you may find that many of your concerns are shared by others…

It’s known by a variety of names, such as the black economy, or even the cash or hidden economy. But whatever the label, its existence is a pebble in the ATO’s shoe that it is forever looking to prise out. As part of that ongoing effort, it has settled upon certain “averages” of what constitutes…

Photo by Sean Pollock on Unsplash The tax rules allow investing taxpayers to claim some deductions related to some of the expenses and costs that are generated when earning interest, receiving dividends or gaining other investment income. Remember, interest from a bank or other financial institution is part of your assessable income for the year.…

Photo by Melissa Walker Horn on Unsplash As most of us know, donations of $2 or more are deductible, and there is flexibility in the rules around donating to emergency relief bodies in that no receipt is required if giving less than $10 (so called “bucket” donations). To be able to claim a tax deduction…

From 1 July 2019, businesses will only be able to claim deductions for payments that are made to workers (employees or contractors) when the employer has complied with the pay- as-you-go (PAYG) withholding and other tax reporting obligations for that payment. If the PAYG withholding rules require a business to withhold an amount from a…

Australians have been taking full advantage of the offerings on the digital marketplace with gusto for years now, but it has only been relatively recently that the rules for goods and services tax (GST) have caught up. With the purchase of digital products such as the streaming or downloading of movies, apps, and e-books and…

A perennial topic regarding tax deductions is claiming expenses for a car. The following notes summarise the most salient points when it comes to claiming a deduction for motor vehicle expenses. Of course every person’s circumstances may be different, but the following covers most of the relevant information. Key points to keep in mind include:…

Being able to make claims for work-related travel expenses is generally an enviable deduction situation, and one that a good many taxpayers would like to achieve — especially given that the status of being deemed an “itinerant” worker brings with it an expectation of a lot of travel kilometres. While itinerant work is generally held…