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Revenue, Fines and Other Legislation Amendment Act 2023 guide

Chapters

  1. Overview
  2. Vesting of land
  3. When does a liability for duty arise?
  4. Aggregation of dutiable transactions
  5. Effect of alteration in purchase price
  6. Transfers in relation to managed investment schemes
  7. Property vested to an apparent purchaser
  8. Establishment of a trust relating to unidentified property and non-dutiable property
  9. Transfers of property in connection with persons changing superannuation funds
  10. Registered native title body corporates
  11. Valuation of property
  12. Changes to the Taxation Administration Act

5. Effect of alteration in purchase price

On this page

Section 31 of the Duties Act 1997

Section 31 of the Duties Act 1997 has been amended to include subsection (3).

This addition clarifies that, when there is a change in the consideration amount, the duty liability will be calculated using the rate of duty applicable at the time the agreement was first executed.

This is applicable to agreements for sale or transfer of dutiable property where the change in the consideration amount occurred after the agreement was entered into but before the property is transferred.

When does the change take effect?

Amendments made to this section of the Duties Act 1997 apply to transactions that occur on or after 4 September 2023.

What are the evidentiary requirements?

EDR

Before processing this transaction type on EDR, the following must be obtained:

  • a copy of any instrument evidencing the alteration in purchase price, and
  • any further details regarding the alteration which may influence the outcome of the assessment.

eDuties

When submitting an application in eDuties for this transaction type, the application must include a copy of:

  • any instrument evidencing the alteration in purchase price, and
  • full copy of the original endorsed agreement
  • Purchaser/Transferee declaration/s
  • client identification
  • any further details and/or documents used to conduct the original assessment
  • any further details regarding the alteration which may influence the outcome of the assessment.

How are these transactions processed?

There is no change to the processing of transactions affected by alterations in purchase price. These transactions will continue to be available via EDR or eDuties.

The April 2019 EDR update provides some instruction on how to process an agreement with a change in the consideration amount.

Refer to the Duties Document Matrix (PDF, 506.95 KB) for other variations to contracts that must be lodged in eDuties.

Where can I find more information?

 

Note

Revenue rulings and CPNs impacted by this change are currently being reviewed. This guide will be updated once any updated rulings and CPNs become available. Existing Revenue rulings can be found on our Revenue rulings page.