Small business skills and training boost – Additional Tax Deductions
Small businesses will get an additional tax deduction on top of the allowable deduction for training their employees.
For expenditure incurred between 7:30pm (AEDT) on 29 March 2022 and 30 June 2024, an additional deduction of 20% is available. For example, a one day training course provided to employees that costs $10,000 will provide an allowable deduction of $12,000 for the employer.
To qualify for the additional deduction, a small business is required to have aggregated turnover of less than $50 million. Additionally, the external training course is required to be provided by a training entity that is registered in Australia. Specifically, in-house or on-the-job training is excluded from the boost.
In the situation where an employer provides external staff training to employees in the 2021–22 income year, they will not be able to receive the 20% additional deduction until lodging the 2022–23 income tax return.
However, for expenses that are incurred in the 2022–23 and 2023–24 income years, the additional deduction may be included in the tax return where the expense is incurred.
Small business technology investment boost – Additional Tax Deductions
An additional deduction will be available for small and medium businesses that commence digital adoptions. The additional deduction will be 20% of the cost incurred for business expenses or depreciable assets that support a digital adoption, including but not limited to:
- portable payment devices
- cyber security systems
- subscriptions to cloud-based services
- online sales platforms, or
- digital tracking for livestock.
An annual cap of $100,000 on expenditure for each income year applies for the additional deduction.
Any eligible costs incurred from 7:30pm (AEDT) on 29 March 2022 to 30 June 2023 are included. However, any expenditure incurred in the 2021-22 income year will not get the additional deduction until the following year’s income tax return.
Extension of Instant Asset Write Offs and Loss Carry Back Scheme
In addition to digital and skills tax boost, the 2022 Federal Budget also introduced rules to allow businesses with annual turnover or total income less than $5 billion to instantly writeoff assets to strengthen business investment and create more jobs, extending the instant write off to 30 June 2023.
The Budget also enabled companies with annual turnover less than $5 billion to offset losses against previously taxed profits to generate a refund and extended it to include the 2022/2023 income year.
Overhauled apprenticeship incentive scheme
The budget announced $2.8 billion in funding for an apprenticeship incentive scheme, providing up to $5,000 payments to new apprentices (in priority sectors) and up to $15,000 in wage subsidies for employers.
More Covid-19 business grants to be tax exempt
Payments from State and Territory business support grant programs will be made non-assessable non-exempt income for tax purposes until 30 June 2022. This includes the recent South Australian COVID-19 Tourism and Hospitality Support Grants and the South Australian Covid-19 Business Hardship Grants.
Overhaul of PAYG & GST tax instalment system
The GDP uplift factor has been set at 2% for 2022/2023 compared to the 10% that would have applied. The uplift factor is applied in the formula for calculating instalments payable under the PAYG system. In real terms this means PAYG and GST instalment payments will be lower in 2022/2023 for businesses under the turnover thresholds, improving cash flow.
Temporary reduction of fuel excise
A temporary reduction of excise and excise-equivalent customs duty has been announced in the 2022 Budget. These excise duties apply to petrol and diesel, as well as other fuel and petroleum-based products except aviation fuel.
The reduction is 50%, sending the current fuel excise from 44.2 cents per litre to 22.1 cents per litre. The reduction will apply from 12:01am on 30 March 2022 to 11:59pm on 28 September 2022.
If you are using heavy vehicles on public roads in your business, there will be a corresponding reduction in fuel tax credits during this temporary reduction in excise. However, as the new excise rate of 22.1 cents per litre is below the road user charge, this will effectively reduce your fuel tax credits down to zero. Once the announcement becomes law, we expect that the ATO will provide guidance to assist you in completing your 31 March 2022 Business Activity Statement for any adjustments necessary.
Primary Producers – Concessional tax treatment for revenue from carbon credit units and biodiversity certificates
Australian carbon credit units (ACCUs) and biodiversity certificate revenue will be treated as primary production income instead of non-primary production income, from 1 July 2022. This means they will be eligible for concessional tax treatment under the primary production tax averaging system and Farm Management Deposit scheme.
If you have any questions regarding the above announcements, the team at Rawson Verco Need will be pleased to assist you.