Kin’s Money

One of the nicest things about having a financial year that starts in July is the impotus to take stock of your financial situation halfway through the year. If you set financial goals at the begining of the year, now is the perfect time to take another look and see what’s working, what’s not, and how to fix it.

For most of us, tax cuts have kicked in this month, giving most people $10 - $20 extra a week in their take home pays. If you’re lucky you might have even scored a pay rise if you had a performance review last month.

Here are 5 things I do to take stock of my finances at the start of the new financial year:

1. Check the new tax tables at the ATO website to make sure the correct amount of tax is being taken out each pay.
2. Check your payslip and make sure any pay rises and tax are correct (while you’re there, make sure your annual leave is accruing at the correct rate).
3. Take a look at your budget/spending plan if you have one, and see what is working, and what isn’t (I’ll be writing a bit more on this over the next few weeks). Make a plan of attack to stay on track with your goals. If you don’t have one, think about creating one!
4. Start a folder to collect information you need for your tax return (PAYG Summaries, HELP/HECS statements, deductions reciepts, super statements etc).
5. Take a look at your financial goals for the year. Are you on track? Close? Nowhere near? Do you need to rethink them? Have your priorities changed? Have interest rate rises and increasing fuel and food costs been included? How is this impacting you achieving your goals? If you didn’t set any financial goals for this year - NOW is the perfect time to set some. Do you want to take a holiday over Christmas? Save $500 by the end of the year to pay for Christmas? Pay of a debt? Pay an extra repayment on your mortgage? Write it down and write a plan of attack to achieve it.

You should now at least have a better idea of where your finances are at than you did yesterday. Some of these can take a fair bit of time (like creating a budget) but others take only a few minutes and are the first step to staying on top of everything.

Is there anything in particular you do at the start of the financial year to stay ahead of the game?

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Welcome to a new financial year. As with any new year, the world is before you. Endless possibilities, and dreams of making millions. Well, at least having more money in the bank in 12 months time than you do now.

Fortunately, we’re given the perfect opportunity to make a start by being able to submit our tax returns and get a nice little boost to start us off.

Over the last few years the tax office has taken to the internet with gusto, and E-Tax has made getting your tax done, submitted and returned easier and saved plenty of trees at the same time.

E-Tax is a program downloaded to your computer where you enter your information and submit it electronically to the tax office. For the vast majority of tax payers who have simple returns, E-tax saves time and generally your return is completed within 14 days.

Who can lodge a return through E-Tax?

According to the ATO, anyone who has:

• lodged a tax return for any of the previous five years (2003 to 2007)
• lodged a refund of franking credits application for any of the previous five years (2003 to 2007), or
• lodged a baby bonus claim for any of the previous five years (2003 to 2007)

is able to use E-Tax to submit their return to the ATO electronically. If you do not fall into one of those categories you can still use E-Tax to complete your return and print the relevant pages, sign them and post them to the ATO with any relevant documentation.

What are the benefits of using E-Tax?

Personally, I find many benefits to using E-Tax. Here are just a few:

1. Able to work on our returns in dribs and drabs as the information arrives. I can save E-Tax and next time I log in I can see where I got up to and what I still need to fill in. This is far better than waiting until all the information has arrived and putting it off because it’s such a big job and leaving it til the last minute!
2. Ability to show an estimated return. This is especially handy if you have a vague idea of how much you expect your return to be. It’s like in maths if you know the answer you can figure out how to get there - using E-Tax you can pick up errors in what you’ve entered by looking at the estimate to see if it’s where you expect it to be or not.
3. Less paperwork. While you still need to keep records of your income and deductions claims, by submitting your return electronically you are not required to send them in, saving time and paper by not having to arrange copying of all your claims.

How does E-Tax work?

E-Tax is a software program you download to your computer. You can then open and work in E-Tax offline and submit it electronically. From the ATO  “The e-tax lodgment process uses a secure sockets layer (SSL) session to prevent unauthorised access during transmission over the internet to the Tax Office. ”

Where do I get it?

E-Tax can be downloaded here from the ATO. Make sure to check system requirements and read the instructions before you get started. The instructions are comprehensive and I find them easy to follow.

What next?

If you do your returns yourself, E-Tax can be a simple way to work on and submit your tax. Remember, the sooner you get it done, the sooner you can get your return. After all, isn’t it better in your bank than theirs?

What about you? Do you use E-Tax? Do you find it easy? Difficult? Time consuming? Easier to pay someone to do it?

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