From 1 July 2018, Single Touch Payroll (STP) commenced its roll out. Employers with more than 20 employees were required to provide real-time reports to the Australian Taxation Office (ATO) of salary and wage payments, super guarantee contributions, ordinary time earnings of employees and PAYG withholding amounts.

From 1 July 2019, STP has now extended to all employers.

The ATO has announced it will soon write to small employers (19 and under employees) who have not yet started reporting or applied for a deferral, to remind them of their STP obligations.

Small employers have until 30 September 2019 to start reporting or apply for extra time to get ready. The ATO will grant deferrals to any small employer who requests additional time to start STP reporting.

There will be no penalties for mistakes, missed or late reports, for the first year, and employers experiencing hardship or who are in areas with intermittent or no internet connection will be able to access exemptions.

Still thinking to yourself, what is STP? Let us fill you in:

• Each employer needs to report their employees’ tax and super information to the ATO on or before each payday. They need to send this information from STP-enabled software
• When STP reporting is in place, employers no longer need to provide payment summaries to their employees for the payments reported and finalised through STP
• Employers no longer need to provide payment summary annual reports to the ATO at the end of the financial year for payments reported through STP
• Employees can view their year-to-date payment information using the ATO’s online services, accessible through their myGov account
• Employers need to complete a finalisation declaration at the end of each financial year. The information reported through STP will not be tax-ready for emloyees or their tax agents until the employer makes this declaration
• Employers need to report employees’ super liability information for the first time through STP. Super funds will then report to the ATO when the employer pays the super amounts to employees funds
• From 2020, the ATO will pre-fill activity labels W1 and W2 for small to medium withholders with the information reported though STP