The government commenced public consultation (closing on 2 October 2024) on revisions to the Code Determination which includes changes to the false and misleading statement requirement. Refer to Treasury’s website for more information and updates. 

We want to assure you that any malicious, vexatious or frivolous reports made to us will be taken very seriously and we may take action against anyone making such reports.

The Government has published an explanatory statement which provides additional guidance on the obligations under the Code Determination, including requirements as to quality management systems. We propose to supplement this guidance with its own guidance in due course. 

We will provide more information about the consultation process via our monthly newsletter, eNews and our social media channels.

If an employee is providing those services in their own right, they need to be registered with us. Find out what services are considered BAS services and require registration.

Yes, that is correct. The annual registration requirement applies to new registrations and renewal applications submitted from 1 July 2024. In practice, this means there will be a staggered implementation. Your current registration will continue for the full 3 years, but once you renew your registration after that period (from 1 July 2024), the annual registration framework will apply.

This was a decision by Government. There are a number of reasons, including to align with the registration periods of other professions across Government and other requirements for tax practitioners, including professional indemnity insurance policies.

Annual registration will also ensure we have greater ongoing visibility of tax practitioner registrations, which will increase consumer confidence that tax practitioners continue to meet their ongoing registration requirements and only those that should be registered are.

You can only lodge a BAS return via myGov if you are a sole trader. To lodge BAS returns on behalf of a company, you must be registered as a tax or BAS agent, or work under the supervision of a tax or BAS agent.

No, there is no minimum requirement of lodgements to remain registered, but you must meet the relevant experience requirement for your registration regulation when you come to renew your registration with us.

If you register as a company or partnership, you also need to have a sufficient number of registered individuals who carry out supervisory arrangements on behalf of the business. For example, if you operate your business through a company, the company will need to be registered and you will either need to be registered as an individual as well, or the company will need to have other registered individuals who can carry out supervisory arrangements on its behalf.

You can request a tax invoice from our Client Services team using our general enquiry form.

The annual declaration process has been retired, so there is no requirement to complete an annual declaration again.

Relevant experience can include work:

• as a registered tax agent
• under the supervision and control of a registered tax agent
• as a legal practitioner
• of another kind.

For your experience to count as relevant experience it must include substantial involvement in one or more types of tax agent services, or substantial involvement in an area of taxation law to which one or more of those types of tax agent services relate.

To find out more about what is considered work of another kind see our information on relevant experience.

Depending on the structure of the franchise arrangement, you may be a franchisee operating a franchise business or an employee of or contractor for the franchise business. The franchisor may be the supervising tax practitioner or a company or partnership. For more information read our guidance.

Client engagement letters are not mandatory under our statutory framework. However, we do strongly recommend the use of engagement letters as they are an important tool that can assist tax practitioners to establish a clear understanding of the elements of engagement between you and your clients. 

It should be noted that written client consent to lodge and engagement letters are 2 separate issues.

In relation to any ATO requirements or regulations, you should contact the ATO directly.

Engagement letters are not required by law, however we recommend you use an engagement letter for any services provided to clients, including an individual tax return. Remember, it does not need to be complex if you are dealing with simple tax affairs. However, even for simple dealings an engagement letter will ensure you and your client have clear expectations and that there is no misunderstanding of the services being provided.

There are no requirements under the Tax Agent Services Act 2009 for what an engagement letter must contain, or how to deal with a change in the scope of engagement. We recommend that any changes in engagement be appropriately documented, acknowledged and accepted by the client.

You must not disclose information relating to a client’s (or a former client's) affairs to a third party unless you have obtained the client’s permission, or you have a legal duty to do so. A third party is any entity other than you and your client. Find out more about third parties.

A third party is any entity other than the client and the registered tax practitioner. This means you should obtain permission from the client prior to disclosing their information to employees, this includes IT and marketing personnel. You may choose to seek client permission via a letter of engagement.

You only need to undertake proof of identity with your client and any person you are dealing with that intends to represent the client. For example, anyone instructing you on behalf of a non-individual client. Find out more about client verification.

Client-to-agent linking is not an approved method for meeting your proof of identity obligations.

If you are registered under a standard BAS agent registration, you must complete 90 hours of continuing professional education (CPE) over 3 years with a minimum of 20 hours completed each year. If you are registered under a conditional registration with a fuel tax credit specialty, you will need to complete 6 hours over 3 years with a minimum of 2 hours being completed each year.

Even if you work part-time, you need to maintain your knowledge and skills to be able to provide competent services to your clients. So, you are still required to complete a minimum of 120 hours of CPE over a 3-year period for a tax agent registration and 90 hours of CPE over a 3-year period for a BAS agent registration.

If you are provided with a certificate upon completing CPE, we recommend you keep it for your records however, where no certificate is provided, you should keep a record of your CPE in a CPE log.

Yes, you can join a software webinar and gain CPE provided the information is relevant to the tax agent or BAS services you provide. 

Yes, you can still gain CPE when watching our webinars. Just make a record of the details of the webinar and the date and time you watched it. We have developed a CPE log that you may like to use to assist with your record keeping requirements.

Yes, if you maintain a CPE log to satisfy membership requirements of a relevant recognised professional association, you don’t need to keep an additional record to satisfy the TPB’s requirements.

You can use continuing professional development you complete for your professional association for the purposes of the TPB as long as it is relevant to the tax agent or BAS services you provide.

If the information is still relevant, you can claim CPE for watching our webinars. You should use your professional judgement when deciding if the webinar you watch is suitable to claim CPE.

Any education activity relevant to the tax agent or BAS services you provide that maintains, develops or promotes your skills, knowledge or attributes, is considered to be a CPE activity.  Importantly, the provision of a tax or BAS service will not, of itself, constitute a CPE activity.

The new CPE requirements will apply to you from the date your renewed registration takes effect. Until this time you will need to complete CPE based on our previous requirements. For further information refer to the scenarios provided in our frequently asked questions.

If you completed the Tax Agent Skill Kit for the purpose of obtaining or renewing your BAS agent registration, you cannot count it again as a CPE activity. However, if you complete the Tax Agent Skill Kit subsequent to gaining your registration (that is, additional study that wasn’t used for the purposes of gaining or renewing registration), it may be acceptable provided it is relevant to the tax agent services you provide.

No, the CPE activities you complete must be relevant to the tax agent or BAS services you provide that maintains, develops or promotes your skills, knowledge or attributes as a registered tax practitioner.

Yes, provided the course is relevant to the tax agent services you provide.

If you experience extenuating circumstances, you should contact us and let us know your circumstances as soon as possible. You should also exercise your professional judgment in this regard and keep appropriate records in relation to your situation. Examples of situations where it might not be possible for you to complete the minimum amount of CPE hours include:

• illness
• disability
• family and/or caring responsibilities (such as maternity or paternity leave)
• financial or other hardship.

In these types of circumstances, we will consider appropriate relief from the minimum amount of CPE hours, provided you can demonstrate that you have attempted to use the flexibility of the 3-year CPE period to manage any extenuating circumstances to comply with our CPE requirements. 

Records should be kept for 5 years from the end of your registration.

If you are a member of a recognised professional association, you can elect to align your CPE period with the CPE period of your professional association. This means you can elect to have your CPE period based on a calendar year, financial year or the anniversary of your association membership start date.

You do not need to advise us if you want to elect a CPE period which aligns with your recognised professional association. You should however keep a record of your elected CPE period – for example, you may want to make a note of your elected CPE period on your CPE log.

Remember, once you make an election you cannot alter your CPE period unless you change your membership to another recognised professional association. In these situations, you can make a new election at the end of your existing CPE period to align it to your new association’s period.

You cannot disclose any information relating to the client’s affairs to the new tax practitioner without the client’s permission or a legal duty to do so. You are, however, able to advise the ATO of this matter if you consider that the information may assist the Commissioner of Taxation to perform their functions or duties under a taxation law in relation to the client, noting that you had a previous relationship with the client and you are eligible for whistleblower protections. This will not contravene the Code, in particular Code item 6 which relates to confidentiality of information relating to a client’s affairs.

To report an unregistered preparer, you need to complete our online complaints form. You should provide as much detail as possible, including any relevant documentation to support your complaint. The more information you provide, the better. We will not act on complaints without sufficient information and evidence. Although you can make an anonymous complaint, we will not progress the complaint unless you are able to provide sufficient information and evidence. Refer to complaints for more information.

You must advise us of your professional indemnity (PI) insurance whenever you update your details or if there is a change in your policy, including every time the policy is renewed. You can update your policy details via My Profile.

If you do not charge a fee or receive a reward (for example, you are an employee or contractor) you will not need to have your own PI insurance policy in order to meet our requirements. However, if you are an employee or contractor, you will be required to provide us with the name of your employer or principal and their registration number. Learn more about PI insurance.

The disqualified entity can facilitate an introduction, however Code item 16 prohibits arrangements with disqualified entities in connection with the provision of tax agent services by the registered tax practitioner. These arrangements cannot be approved by the TPB.

You must take reasonable steps and make reasonable enquiries to determine if an entity you employ or use to provide tax agent services on your behalf is a disqualified entity.

To assist, we have published information regarding minimum steps that you should take to comply with your Code obligations.

Learn more about how to determine if an entity is a disqualified entity.

Code item 15 applies to all employees, associates, contractors and others involved in the provision of tax agent services on behalf of the registered tax practitioner. It does not apply to staff not involved in the provision of tax agent services, such as administrative support staff.

Code item 16 only applies to particular types of arrangements. For further information on what type of arrangements are covered by Code item 16, please refer to our Information sheet under the heading 'Tax agent services provided in connection with an arrangement'.

Code item 6 requires tax practitioners to ensure confidentiality of client information.  In addition to a tax practitioner’s obligations under Code item 6, the Privacy Act 1988 (Cth) (Privacy Act) sets out several Privacy Principles which govern the use of, storage and disclosure of personal information and other conduct by organisations.

Some of these privacy principles require specific notifications to be provided detailing how a person’s information will be used, stored and disclosed, including under offshoring arrangements and consent may be required for this to occur. 
From a compliance perspective, it may be difficult to ensure that an offshore service is taking reasonable steps to protect client information in accordance with Code item 6 and Australian privacy principles. For this reason, many entities choose to ensure client information is processed and stored within Australia.

You should seek your own advice about whether the Privacy Act applies to you. Information about obligations under the Privacy Act is available from the Office of Australian Information Commissioner. 

We can’t recommend software providers. This is a business decision, and you will need to research providers and consider things such as:

• What privacy provisions are in place?
• What would happen in the unfortunate event of a breach?
• Who owns the data?
• Who has access to the data?
• Where is the data stored and backed-up?
• What service and support is offered?
• Does the provider comply with Australian privacy laws?
• Under what circumstances would the provider access your data or disclose it to a third party?
• Will you be notified if your data has been lost, breached or its security compromised?
• How much the cloud service costs?

If in doubt, you should seek advice from the Office of Australian Information Commissioner.