Amidst the challenging prospect of a significant reduction in GST revenue, the Northern Territory has managed to allow a number of tax-related measures in the 2018 Budget.
Across most state budgets for 2018/19, we’re seeing measures to stimulate employment, especially for local-based and regional workers and payroll tax relief as part of a package of measures. The Northern Territory has also implemented such measures with conditional payroll tax exemptions.
The exemptions apply for NT resident employees who started or start new jobs in the period 1 May 2018 through to 30 June 2020. Along with a number of other key measures including allowing miners to deduct the costs associated with building social infrastructure and accommodation for local employees when calculating royalties and removing deductions for travel and costs for non-NT resident employees, the exemptions form the bases of the Local Employment Package.
“The exemption is a great prospect for NT businesses but they will need to verify every employee’s status correctly in order to qualify for the exemption,” Peter Tobin of Tobin Partners said.
Peter explained that as Payroll Tax Specialists, they see first-hand, the difficulties that some companies experience when they attempt to self-assess their payroll tax.
“Payroll Tax is a complex tax with each state adopting different rates, thresholds, exemptions and conditions,” Peter said. “Many NT businesses will have both local and non-local, FIFO, employees and this needs to be carefully addressed in the light of this new announcement.”
In this specific case, the definition of ‘new jobs’ and ‘NT-resident’ needs to be clearly established and understood and applied accordingly, especially for businesses operating close to the borders with Queensland, South Australia and Western Australia.
National Approach to Local Issues
With offices in Brisbane and Sydney, Tobin Partners handle payroll tax for companies across Australia and can offer a national approach to the differing aspects across the states.
“For companies with operations in several states, which is very prevalent in the mining and resources sectors, it can be particularly beneficial to review payroll tax across the entire group and strategically structure to take advantage of many of the new payroll tax measures being offered by various states,” Peter said.
To discuss how the Northern Territory Local Employment Package and changes to Payroll Tax effect your business, speak with us at Tobin Partners, Lawyers by email or call Peter Tobin 0438 001 809 for a confidential discussion on how to calculate payroll tax for your business.
