Listen

We have improved the payroll tax annual return

27 May 2024

New payroll tax features in 2024 include prefilled information, pop-up prompts and a streamlined way of cancelling your registration.

On this page

 

It is important that NSW employers get their payroll tax right.

We have simplified the annual return in Payroll Tax Online to:

  • help you calculate payroll tax more accurately, and
  • help your business understand which payments are taxable so you can report them correctly.
 

The 2024 annual return in Payroll Tax Online will be available from 9 June.

We are standardising the words we use to improve our online services. From 9 June 2024, “annual reconciliation" will be called "annual return" in Payroll Tax Online and on the Revenue NSW website.

Watch video

In this video we provide an overview of the changes to the 2024 payroll tax annual return lodgement.

Changes to the 2024 Annual Return Lodgement from Revenue NSW on Vimeo.

What is changing?

1. Prefilled information

To save you time the new annual return prefills some of your business details for you.
This may include:

  • Australian Business Number (ABN)
  • number of employees
  • main business activity (ANZSIC industry code)
  • Ultimate Holding Company (UHC)
  • NSW Government department status (if applicable).

Making sure your information is up to date helps us understand your business better.

Please check that the prefilled information is correct. If the details are out of date you can type over them to update them. You will need to contact us to update the NSW Government department status.

2. New pop-up prompts

To minimise errors, the annual return form now has pop-up prompts that guide you when:

  • wage components like allowances and commissions were reported last year but are entered as ‘0’ this year
  • salaries, wages, fringe benefits, contractor and interstate wages show a significant increase or decrease from the previous year
  • superannuation amounts entered are low in comparison to salaries and wages, and
  • information for trainees, apprentices or interstate staff differs from last year’s entries.

Learn more about taxable wages.

3. Workforce details

In response to common errors relating to employment agency and contractor provisions, we have added a new section to the annual return form.

This will help businesses who use contractors, staff from employment agencies or labour hire, to correctly calculate their payroll tax.

This section covers payments:

  • made to contractors and if contractor exemptions have been applied, and
  • made under employment agency or labour hire contracts, and whether those payments are liable for payroll tax.

For more details, read:

4. Streamlined payroll tax cancellation

If you anticipate your business will not have a payroll tax liability from 1 July 2024 you can now cancel your payroll tax registration while completing your annual return.

Your wage and grouping details will be prefilled with the information you have provided to us in your annual return.

When appropriate, we may also suggest cancelling your registration based on the information you have provided in your annual return.

What is not changing?

You will still need to lodge your annual return on Payroll Tax Online and pay by 28 July 2024, or the next business day if 28 July is on a weekend or public holiday.

You will need your Client ID and Correspondence ID to log in to Payroll Tax Online.

Read more about how to lodge your annual return.

Contact the payroll tax team

If you have questions about this topic call 1300 139 815 or +61 2 7808 6904 for international callers.

You can also email [email protected]