Annual Company Tax Return
If you lodge your company tax return yourself, it is due 28 February. If you lodge through a registered tax agent, most companies get until 15 May. That is an extra two and a half months of cash in the business, and it is the single most common reason companies move to an agent.
BOX Advisory Services is a registered tax agent based in Sydney. We prepare and lodge company tax returns for businesses across Australia, on a fixed fee agreed before we start.
Awards & recognitions
Who Can Lodge Company Tax Returns?
A company is its own taxpayer. It lodges its own tax return every income year from registration until it is deregistered, whether or not it traded, made a profit, or paid you anything. That return is separate from your personal one.
Lodging it yourself
A director or authorised officer can lodge through the tax office’s Online services for business, using a myGovID linked to the company. You carry the risk on every figure in it, and your deadline is 28 February rather than 15 May.
Lodging through a registered tax agent
A registered tax agent lodges on your behalf through the agent lodgement program, using standard business reporting software. That is what gives you the later due date, and it puts a second set of eyes on the taxable income calculation before anything is submitted.
Checking an agent is registered
Only a registered tax agent can charge a fee to prepare and lodge a return on your behalf. Every agent is listed on the Tax Practitioners Board register, so check the number before you hand over your accounts. Ours is 25452828.
How to Lodge a Company Tax Return
Only a registered tax agent can charge a fee to prepare and lodge a return on your behalf. Every agent is listed on the Tax Practitioners Board register, so check the number before you hand over your accounts. Ours is 25452828.
1. Close off the accounts
Reconcile the financial year in your accounting software. Every bank account, loan account and credit card needs to agree to the bank statements. Wages, superannuation and any director loan balances need to be right before anything else is worth doing.
2. Prepare the financial statements
Profit and loss, balance sheet, and the reconciliations that support them. These are what the tax return is built from, and preparing them properly is most of the work.
3. Work out taxable income
Accounting profit is not taxable income. Add back the expenses that are not deductible for tax purposes, adjust for the difference between accounting and tax depreciation, apply any carried forward losses, and account for anything else treated differently for tax. This is where returns go wrong quietly.
4. Apply the right company tax rate
25% if the company is a base rate entity, 30% if it is not. Getting this wrong in either direction is common and expensive. See our guide to the company tax rate [LINK: /small-business-handbook/accounting/company-tax-rate/].
5. Handle Division 7A
If the company lent money to a director or shareholder, or paid private costs on their behalf, that has to be structured correctly or it is treated as an unfranked dividend in their hands. This is the single most common reason a self prepared company tax return is amended later.
6. Lodge and pay
Submit the return, then pay any income tax owing by the due date. If the company is due a refund, it is generally paid to the nominated company bank account within a few weeks.
When Is a Company Tax Return Due?
Standard due dates
| How you lodge | Due date |
|---|---|
| Self-lodging | 28 February |
| Through a registered tax agent | 15 May (most companies) |
| Prior year return outstanding | 31 October |
| Large or medium taxpayer | Generally 15 January |
Dates assume a 30 June balancing date. If your company has a substituted accounting period, every date shifts accordingly.
If a prior year is outstanding
This is the one that catches people. If you have an outstanding return from an earlier income year, you lose the extended agent deadline entirely and everything becomes due 31 October. If you are behind, the fastest way back onto the 15 May program is to bring the old years up to date now rather than at the deadline.
Failure to lodge penalties
Missing a lodgement attracts a failure to lodge penalty that accrues for each 28 day period the return is late, and general interest charge applies to unpaid income tax on top of that. The penalty applies whether or not the company owes anything, so a nil return lodged late still costs you. See all upcoming dates on our key deadlines page.
What You Need Before You Start
Bank statements and reconciliations
Full year statements for every company bank account and credit card, reconciled in your accounting software. If an account was opened or closed mid year, we need it too.
Wages, payment summaries and superannuation
Single Touch Payroll finalisation, the payment summary details for every employee, and evidence that superannuation was paid by the quarterly deadlines. Super is only deductible in the year it is actually received by the fund, not the year it is accrued, which surprises a lot of employers.
Assets and depreciation
A list of assets bought or sold during the year with dates and costs, plus the existing depreciation schedule. Assets are one of the biggest sources of difference between your accounting profit and your taxable income, so getting the schedule right matters more than most people expect.
Receipts and legitimate business expenses
Receipts for anything material, and a clear split where a cost was partly private. Legitimate business expenses are deductible; private costs run through the company are not, and they create a Division 7A problem as well as a deduction problem.
Taxable payments annual report
If your company is in building and construction, cleaning, courier, road freight, IT or security services, you may also need to lodge a taxable payments annual report covering what you paid contractors. It is a separate lodgement to the company tax return and it has its own deadline of 28 August.
Company Tax Rates
Base rate entities
A company pays 25% if it is a base rate entity, which broadly means aggregated turnover under $50 million and no more than 80% of its total income coming from passive sources such as interest, rent, dividends or investments. Most owner operated companies qualify.
Companies taxed at 30%
Everything else pays 30%. A company that started as a trading business and drifted into holding investments can cross the passive income threshold without anyone noticing, so it is worth checking each income year rather than assuming last year’s rate still applies.
Common Mistakes We See
Treating accounting profit as taxable income
The two are rarely the same number. Entertainment, some fines and penalties, and the private portion of mixed costs are not deductible for tax purposes even though they sit in your profit and loss.
Director loans left unaddressed
Money taken out of the company during the year and not repaid or documented becomes a deemed dividend. It is fixable before lodgement and expensive afterwards.
Claiming private costs as business expenses
A home internet account, a family car, a phone used for both. These are apportionable, not fully claimable, and the tax office asks about them.
Missing the superannuation deadline
Super paid late is not deductible in that income year at all, and the shortfall has to be reported separately. An employer can lose a full year of deduction on wages related super for being a few days late.
Company vs Sole Trader Tax Returns
Sole traders report business income in their personal tax return and pay tax at individual marginal rates. A company lodges separately, pays a flat rate, and keeps its own losses. The trade off is that a company costs more to run and cannot simply have money withdrawn from it, which is exactly the risk Division 7A exists to police.
If you are weighing up the two structures, the tax rate is rarely the deciding factor. Asset protection, how much profit you actually need to draw out, and what you plan to do with the business matter more.
Why Lodge a Business Tax Return Through a Registered Tax Agent
The extended lodgement program
The 15 May due date is only available through an agent. For a company with tax to pay, that is two and a half extra months to plan for the payment rather than scramble at it.
A second set of eyes on taxable income
Most of the value is not in the lodgement, it is in steps three and five. Someone who does this every day will find the depreciation treatment, the carried forward losses and the director loan issues that a self prepared return misses.
A fixed fee agreed up front
When you lodge a business tax return through BOX, the fee is agreed before we start. You also get an accountant who has looked at whether the structure is still the right one, rather than one who has filled in the boxes and moved on.
What It Costs
It depends on the state of the accounts and the complexity of the structure. A single company with clean, reconciled books is straightforward. A group with trusts, inter entity loans and multiple bank accounts is not. We quote a fixed fee after looking at the file rather than from a price list, because those two jobs are not the same job.
Lodge Your Company Tax Return With BOX
We have been preparing company tax returns for Australian business owners for over 13 years. Fixed fee, agreed before we start, and a single point of contact who knows your file. Book a free 20 minute call and we will tell you what your return actually involves.
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