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ATO guide to the 5 most common Tax Time mistakes

Chris Thorne - Thursday, August 02, 2018

As Tax Time 2018 has 'kicked off', the ATO has profiled the five most common mistakes they see, including taxpayers who are

  • Leaving out some of their income (e.g., forgetting a temp or cash job, capital gains on cryptocurrency, or money earned from the sharing economy) 
  • Claiming deductions for personal expenses (e.g., home to work travel, normal clothes or personal phone calls) 
  • Forgetting to keep receipts or records of their expenses (around half of the adjustments the ATO makes are because the taxpayer had no records, or they were poor quality) 
  • Claiming for something they never paid for - often because they think everyone is entitled to a 'standard deduction' 
  • Claiming personal expenses for rental properties - either claiming deductions for times when they are using their property themselves, or claiming interest on loans used to buy personal assets like a car or boat.
ATO Assistant Commissioner Kath Anderson reiterated the three 'golden rules' for work-related expenses: "You must have spent the money yourself and not have been reimbursed, it must be directly related to earning your income, and you must have a record to prove it."


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