A superannuation specialist has reminded practitioners 30 June this year falls on a Sunday and the significance of this occurrence with regard to contributions and minimum pension payments.
“What that means is any contributions [relating to the 2024 income year] will have to be made on or before 28 June, being the Friday,” Knowledge Shop superannuation adviser Natalie Scott told attendees of a technical webinar hosted by Accurium today.
“When I say ‘made’, we need to make sure they’ve hit the [super fund’s] bank account before that date, not that you’ve paid them on that date. [So the contribution] needs to be in the SMSF’s [bank] account because that’s the last [working] day of the financial year.”
However, Scott noted there is a certain situation that may provide an exception to this practice.
“However, [Taxation Ruling 2010/1] does make specific mention that if the taxpayer [is using the] same bank [as the SMSF], then quite often that transaction will happen instantaneously. So that might mean if you did the transfer on the Sunday, it should go through automatically on 30 June,” she said.
To provide some compliance comfort from this perspective, she recommended practitioners ensure trustees retain a copy of the receipt issued on 30 June for the monies in question to guard against circumstances where the bank acknowledges the payment in the current financial year, but does not process it until 1 July.
“However, that being said, it is probably best to make sure clients do make the contribution a few days earlier.”
She took the opportunity to point out the same payment timing rules apply to pension payments as well and trustees must be conscious of this fact if a final transfer in the 2024 financial year is needed to meet their minimum pension obligations.
“So if the payment was made out of the super fund and it hit the member’s bank account, then you will have met the minimum pension requirements for the 2024 [income] year,” she said.
“[Again] because 30 June is a Sunday, we want to make sure that payment is made by 28 June.”
