Employees
JobKeeper payments will be included on your income statement as salary
and wages or an allowance, and needs to be included in your tax return.
This information will automatically be included (pre-filled) in your tax return
as your employer finalises your income statement. Tax agents also have
access to this information.
Sole traders

Sole traders who received JobKeeper payments on behalf of their business
will need to include the payments as assessable income for the business in
their tax return.

JobSeeker
From 20 March 2020, the new JobSeeker Payment replaced certain
Centrelink payments you may receive from Services Australia.
As a result of these changes, your Centrelink payment summary for
2019–20 may detail two types of payments, for both the earlier payments
and new JobSeeker payments.
If you received JobSeeker payments (and any earlier payments), we will
pre-fill this information into the relevant labels in your tax return when it has
been reported to us by Services Australia. This information is usually
available by the end of the first week in July each year.

Working from home
We recognise that due to COVID-19, a significant number of employees
and business owners started working from home from 1 March and are
incurring additional running expenses in relation to their income producing
activities.
In addition to the existing fixed rate and actual cost methods, we introduced
a temporary ‘shortcut method’ of 80 cents per hour worked from home. You
can use this method between 1 March and 30 June 2020 for the 2019–20
income year. This method is an all-inclusive rate that requires simple
record keeping and a single calculation step.
While the shortcut method initially only applied for the period 1 March 2020
to 30 June 2020 it has now been extended up until 30 June 2021. This

means, if you use the shortcut method you can claim your work from home
expenses for the period between:
 1 March 2020 to 30 June 2020 in your 2019–20 tax return
 1 July 2020 to 30 June 2021 in your 2020–21 tax return.
We encourage you to use the method or combination of methods that best
suits your circumstances. This means, for the 2019–20 income year you
can use one of the existing methods to work out your expenses for either:
 the whole income year
 the period from 1 July 2019 to 29 February 2020, then use the
shortcut method from 1 March 2020 to 30 June 2020.
You can only use one of the methods at a time in a date range.
You can't use the shortcut method to work out your claim for working from
home expenses for the period 1 July 2019 to 29 February 2020. You can
use either the existing working from home fixed rate (52 cents) or actual
expenses method for this period.
Once you have calculated your deduction, enter the amount at 'Other work-
related expenses' in your tax return.
Early release of superannuation
Eligible individuals economically affected by COVID-19 can access some of
their superannuation (super) early. The application is available through
ATO online services in myGov.
If eligible, you are able to access up to $10,000 of super before 30 June
2020 and a further $10,000 from 1 July 2020 until 24 September 2020.
You do not need to pay tax on amounts of super released as a result of
COVID-19 and will not need to include it in your tax return.
Services Australia income compliance program
refunds

If you receive a refund from the Services Australia income compliance
program, you or your tax agent do not need to take any action for tax
purposes. That is:
 you will not be taxed on this amount
 you should not include it in your tax return
 you do not have to submit an amendment for a prior year return.
Submitting an amendment may affect your assessable tax income and any
repayment amounts. If you need to lodge an amendment for other
purposes, contact us or your tax agent for assistance.
Reducing superannuation minimum drawdown rates
To support retirees with account-based pensions and similar products from
having to sell investment assets in their self-managed super funds (SMSF)
to fund minimum drawdown requirements, minimum drawdown
requirements have been reduced by 50% for 2019–20 and 2020–21
income years.
For SMSF trustees who have paid their member the minimum drawdown
amount, payments can be stopped for the remainder of the year, if the
member chooses to do so.
For those who have paid more than the minimum drawdown amount, their
member can only recontribute these amounts if they are eligible to make
super contributions, subject to other rules or limits such as contributions
caps.
There is no maximum amount other than the balance of your super
account, unless it is a transition to retirement pension which is not in the
retirement phase. In this case, the maximum amount is 10% of the account
balance.
Low and middle income tax offset
The low and middle income tax offset (LMITO) announced in the 2018–19
Federal Budget continues to be available for 2019–20.

An offset is not a refund and can only reduce the amount of tax you need to
pay. The amount of the offset you may be entitled to will vary depending on
your individual circumstances, such as your income level and how much
tax you have paid throughout the year. The maximum offset amount is
$1,080 per year.
You don't need to complete a section in your tax return to get this tax
offset. We work out your tax offset for you once you lodge your tax return. If
using myTax, the amount will be displayed in the estimate calculation.