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Getting Smart with Single Touch Payroll (STP)
by Whiz Consulting Accounting and Bookkeeping ServiceIf you are a small business owner, you must have heard about Single Touch Payroll (STP). STP is a payroll reporting regulation introduced by the Australian Tax Office (ATO) to help lessen employers' payroll reporting burdens. STP started on 1 July 2018 for employers with 20 or more employees and 1 July 2019 for employers with 19 or lesser employees. STP has helped businesses in Australia report to ATO regularly throughout the year instead of reporting it annually.
Who Need to Reports:
If you are an employer, you are obligated to report STP, which means even if you have one employee, you still have to report STP. You have to count the following individual as an employee – full-time employees, part-time employees, employees based overseas, casual employees and any employee absent or on leave (paid or unpaid).
You must not include few individuals in the headcount like – past employees, independent contractors, outsourced staff provided by a third-party labour hire organisation, religious practitioners and closely held payees. A closely held payee is a person who is financially connected to the company from which they get payments. It could include members of a family company or trust fund recipients. There are concessional reporting options for small employers with closely held payees.
If you have one to four employees, you are still considered a micro employer. As a micro employer, there are several ways to report STP information that can be cost-effective. Few micro employers can apply for the quarterly reporting concession, allowing to adjust and transit with ease to real-time digital reporting. This concession is, however, provided to micro employers who are experiencing exceptional circumstances.
How to Start Reporting:
If you want to start reporting, you have to consider how you will report STP. You can conduct your STP reporting yourself through STP-enabled software or with the help of an STP or payroll service provider. Using STP-enabled software will make your STP reporting process easy and seamless. It sends the report to the ATO directly. You must take care of two events which are Pay Event and Update Event. Pay events are lodged with ATO on or before the date of the payment made to employees. Update events are for times when you made adjustments to historical pay runs in the financial year and need to bring forward the most up-to-date information to the ATO.
STP helps your employee to get an overview of their superannuation information on the ATO's site. The annual payment summary provided by you to your employees will help them lodge their income return.
How can your financial advisor help with the changes?
Financial reporting services providers have the expertise and professionalism in handling these kinds of updates and changes. If you have not yet been updated with the STP changes, it's advisable to contact your financial advisor as early as possible to discuss the best reporting choice for you and any steps you need to take. Consult with your adviser on applying for a concession, and visit the ATO website for further information.
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About Whiz Consulting 
Accounting and Bookkeeping Service
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Created on Sep 10th 2021 02:36. Viewed 337 times.
