The ATO disqualified more than 250 SMSF trustees in the September quarter with this number representing a high point for compliance action in the past year.
The regulator stated: “As a result of an increased compliance focus, we disqualified 261 trustees during the September quarter of 2022. This is more than we disqualified for the entire 2022 financial year.”
An examination of the information related to the disqualifications, which is available on a public register of disqualified trustees, showed around 40 per cent of those disqualified came from a single state and a similar number were in an SMSF with their marriage partner.
Specifically, 105 disqualified trustees were recorded as living in New South Wales, followed by 59 in Victoria, 49 in Queensland, 38 in Western Australia and the remainder in the Northern Territory, South Australia and Tasmania.
Of the 261 people disqualified, at least 106 were in an SMSF with their spouse, as 53 couples with the same surnames were identifiable from the data. Another 20 trustees were in a family SMSF, with six groups of trustees, with the same surnames in each group, being identifiable from the data.
The ATO stated that as the regulator of SMSFs it can disqualify SMSF trustees, or directors of a corporate trustee, if they fail to comply with super law or the regulator is concerned about their suitability to be a trustee.
The names of the trustees disqualified in the September quarter have been added to the ATO register of disqualified trustees, which has been in place since October 2012 and currently numbers 3877 people.
In a range of separate updates released at the same time, the ATO reminded SMSF trustees they must comply with a number of specific events related to the management of their fund.
Trustees who had funds that required them to lodge their SMSF annual return (SAR) were encouraged to take action in that regard to prevent the fund’s status being change on Super Fund Lookup and also to ensure an SMSF auditor had been appointed to the fund 45 days before the SAR was lodged.
SMSF trustees were also reminded that where they used a corporate trustee for their fund, they were required to pay the Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC) annual review fee.
“If you fail to pay your fees on time, you run the risk of your company being deregistered by ASIC. Unless a replacement trustee is appointed prior to the deregistration of the corporate trustee, there is a risk that your fund will be in breach of superannuation law,” the ATO said.
