ATO no longer sending out Instalment Notices and Activity Statements

Missing your December ATO notice? Instalment Notices and Activity Statements are no longer being sent out by the ATO. Here’s what you need to know…

What happened:

It has come to our attention that in December the ATO decided to stop sending out monthly or quarterly PAYG Instalment Notices and Business/Instalment Activity Statements.

These changes mean that December Quarter 2020 PAYG Instalment Notices and Business Activity Statements were not sent out by the ATO to either clients or to Allworths.

We were not notified of this change by the ATO, however, we have confirmed the change is published on the ATO website. Instead of regularly notifying taxpayers of their PAYG Instalment or Activity Statement obligations, as has occurred in the past, the ATO are now passing the responsibility to taxpayers to regularly check whether or not they have such obligations, either via the Business Portal or via MyGov.

What happens next:

Where we regularly prepare and lodge Business Activity Statements for clients, we will continue to prepare these and lodge them with the ATO electronically, so there is no change for these clients.

Many of our clients have previously relied on receiving a paper PAYG Instalment Notice or Activity Statement, either directly from the ATO or via our office, as a prompt to either lodge the form themselves or pay the amount owed to the ATO. If you are one of these clients, please note that no further Activity Statements will be mailed out by the ATO.

Where PAYG Instalment Notices and Activity Statements have previously been lodged electronically, the ATO are no longer sending notifications to Allworths that the documents have been issued.

What you can do if affected:

Given these ATO changes, going forward we would ask all clients with anticipated PAYG Instalment and Activity Statement obligations to please ensure that:

• Where Business Activity Statements are prepared and lodged by you – please check the Business Portal. The ATO should notify you by email that the Business Activity Statement is available, so please ensure that your email address is up to date in the Business Portal.
• For PAYG Instalment Notices, your notice will be available either in the Business Portal or in your MyGov account. The ATO should notify you by email that the PAYG Instalment Notice is available, so please ensure that your email address is up to date in the Business Portal and in your MyGov account.

Please check your obligations in this regard on either the Business Portal or in your MyGov account as noted above.

Important dates:

We note the following lodgement and payment due dates for December: