In this guide, we’ll discuss common STP reporting issues and ways to fix them.
General Reporting Issues
| Reporting Issue | What you need to do |
| You missed sending an STP report. | Your employees will not see the right year-to-date amounts in ATO online services. You will have various options, such as:
If you continue to miss reports, you may be liable for failure to file penalties after the first year of reporting. |
| You began reporting, and your software is not connecting to the ATO. | Check ATO’s start reporting checklist and follow the steps before you file your first report. There are various methods for connecting your software to the ATO. In most cases, your digital service provider will tell you how to do this part of your STP setup. |
| You have filed your first STP report and want to know whether the ATO has received it. | You don’t need to call the ATO to confirm your report has been received. The ATO will send you a confirmation message after receiving your STP report. The message will be displayed in your software. The ATO will also send a welcome letter to you when you start reporting through STP. |
| You use more than one payroll solution and are not sure which Business Management Software ID to use. If you use the wrong ID, your employees may not see the right information in ATO online services through myGov. This could affect their pre-filling at tax time. | You can report separately from each payroll solution. Most products will assign the BMS ID for you. Speak to your DSP to find out about the ID you need to use. |
| You filed the STP report many days after paying your employees. | The law requires you to lodge your STP report on or before the day you pay your employees. If you make an out-of-cycle payment, this can be reported in your next regular pay cycle. But if you are submitting your reports late, the ATO:
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| You used a TFN exemption code for an employee who has not given you their TFN. | If your employee gives you a different valid TFN, you need to report with this new valid TFN. When you use a TFN exemption code, the STP information you report can’t be matched to your employee, which means they can’t see their year-to-date tax and super information on ATO Online services. Continuing to use a TFN exemption will impact your employee’s ability to use pre-filled information at tax time. |
| You entered the wrong ABN in your STP report. | You need to report the right ABN. If you use the wrong ABN, the ATO won’t be able to match the information you report to the records of your business entity, or your employees’ myGov account. |
| You are not sure whether you need to report super. | You need to report super amounts using STP. For each employee, ensure you report the following each pay period:
If you pay more than the minimum super guarantee liability, report that amount. If the year-to-date super liability for an employee is zero, report zero, but don’t leave the field blank. |
| You deleted unused or legacy pay codes from your payroll software. | Deleting pay codes may impact the correctness of your STP data. While your software may allow you to do this, you need to check if the pay code was used in a previous STP report in the same financial year. If you delete a pay code, you need to check that your data is correct before you submit your report. |
| You are a related entity, and you must lodge STP reports on behalf of other ABNs in the group. | A related entity that lodges STP reports on behalf of other ABNs within a group must have a business authority to file on their behalf. You can build this authority. The way you do this depends on whether the entity has been related to Relationship Authorisation Manager (RAM):
The entity can select the type of permission they want to provide. |
| Your software requests an email address for each employee. | Although it’s not mandatory, including the employee’s email address helps us address the employee if the TFN doesn’t match ATO’s records. If your software requires you to enter an email address for an employee and they don’t have one, ask your DSP what to do. Don’t enter an invalid or fake email address. |
You can consider getting in touch with the best accountant Melbourne for accurate STP reporting.
Conclusion
The blog shares general STP reporting issues and what you need to do to fix them. For information, you can speak to Reliable Melbourne Accountants.