On the road: How to treat work-related travel and living away from home costs

When you’re travelling, you may wonder if the expenses you incur during your work trip are deductible. This newsletter will go through the ATO’s new guidance on the tax treatment of travel expenses. This includes going through the conditions that allow the expenses to be deducted, the expenses which could be deducted, and the treatment of travel allowances. Furthermore, we have provided a table that differentiates between a travel allowance, and a living away from home allowance.

SMSFs & property development: Emerging risks

An investment for a Self-Managed Super Fund (SMSF) to consider is property development. It can build up wealth more quickly than other investments, and enjoy concessional tax treatments. We will go through how to undertake a property development investment or arrangement, contraventions that may cause an SMSF being non-compliant, and some general tips around property investment under an SMSF.

Claiming GST credits for employee reimbursements

Employers registered for the Goods and Services Tax (GST) may be entitled to claim GST credits for employee-reimbursed expenses. The newsletter will go over the criteria to allow the credit, when businesses are not entitled to the credit, and how reimbursements work.

Buying a new home before selling the old one: The ins and outs

One way to purchase a new house is to buy the house whilst still holding your current house. Will there be any Capital Gains Tax treatments this way? Depending on how long you hold both houses, you may be entitled to a concession. We will go over the conditions to be eligible for the concession, possible partial exemptions, and the absence concession.

Trust distributions to non‑residents

There may be some tax implications by an Australian trust if they were to make a distribution to a non-resident beneficiary. We will go over the tax liabilities on the non-resident beneficiary and the trustee, as well as the tax implications on certain income streams, such as dividends, interest, and capital gains.

Stapling super: Reducing multiple accounts for employees

The Australian Government has implemented new legislation that will prevent employees from accumulating multiple superfund accounts. Possessing multiple superfund accounts can cause issues, such as missing funds, multiple fees, premiums and many more. This newsletter will go over the specifics of this new legislation aims to help employees, and provide you an example of how this works for Australians.