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Helping to level the playing field

A good reputation with the Tax Office brings more advantages than it might at first appear. Financiers also take note of a company’s tax history.

In recent months there has been an increasing tendency with financiers to condition their finance approvals for equipment finance and overdraft facilities with a requirement to obtain a written statement from the borrower’s accountant, confirming that all taxes and statutory payments including superannuation contributions are up to date.

The definition of up-to-date relates mainly to not being behind in payment of a BAS and not being under any formal arrangement (especially a recent one) with the ATO for repayment of arrears.

Other business financiers such as those offering invoice discounting and factoring products are not as stringent, as it is mostly the tightening of cash flow that causes arrears and taxes, and factoring companies are in the business of freeing up cash flow.

The foregoing is a genuine reason in an industry with such a high capital equipment and debt funding requirement, to keep the tax man current.

The ATO has recently been quite transparent in outlining its policy on debt collection to small businesses. This has been through the general newspapers, letters of information sent directly to small businesses from the tax office and, of course, information plastered all over the ATO’s website.

For those of you (the great majority) who pay taxes on time, you can afford a sly smirk that the ATO is not letting the naughty ones go by, thus creating an uneven playing field or competitive market place.

The ATO states it will assess each business or situation on an individual basis. This has even included a temporary sanction for businesses to voluntarily get themselves up to date without penalty. Can’t get fairer than that.

However, on an individual case basis, it means that if the Tax Office investigates and views a business not viable, such as insufficient profitability to create cash flows to pay tax, they would be sure to deal with it appropriately.

Then there are other businesses, that may be hit by unforeseen circumstances causing a temporary squeeze on cash flow, that will be able to work out a deal with the Tax Office. After all, it is not in anyone’s interest to see a viable business pushed over the edge.

I have witnessed some of my customers who have been squeezed for cash at BAS time actually contact the ATO and enter an informal arrangement to take care of the arrears while keeping their current (or go-forward) position up to date. The Tax Office seems to take the view (an informal observation) that if a business has a good history in paying tax, it will stand well for leniency in setting arrangements.

It goes without saying that a business that has a poor record of tax payment or is unwilling to meet and maintain arrangements should expect firmer action being taken.

The Tax Office seems to view insolvency or liquidation as pretty much a last resort and is usually only instigated against serial offenders or those who refuse to cooperate.

As a consequence the Tax Office’s powers have been broadened to extend to some pretty interesting alternatives. A good one is the garnishee. As you would know, the Tax Office can find out just about anything about your business, including the bank accounts the business conducts.This little gem, the garnishee, can actually be applied to the business bank account to extract the required amount from routine deposits. Wouldn’t this create or magnify existing cash fl ow difficulties?

All this, though, is to ensure that viable businesses be given a chance and nonviable businesses be eradicated to ensure that those who do the right thing are not disadvantaged within their marketplace.

I guess the point of this story is not just to make you aware of the ATO’s position, but also to note that at a much more everyday level, your financiers would like to ensure they are lending to businesses that are meeting all of their commitments.

Phone Wade on: 0412 269 722

Who are we?

‘We’, ‘us’ and ‘our’ refer to Wade Oldham Finance Pty Ltd ACN 070 940 797.

Our commitment to protect your privacy

We understand how important it is to protect your personal information. This document sets out our privacy policy commitment in respect of personal information we hold about you and what we do with that information.
We recognise that any personal information we collect about you will only be used for the purposes we have collected it or as allowed under the law. It is important to us that you are confident that any personal information we hold about you will be treated in a way which ensures protection of your personal information.
Our commitment in respect of personal information is to abide by the Australian Privacy Principles for the protection of personal information, as set out in the Privacy Act and any other relevant law.

Personal information

When we refer to personal information we mean information from which your identity is reasonably apparent. This information may include information or an opinion about you. The personal information we hold about you may also include credit information.
Credit information is information which is used to assess your eligibility to be provided with finance and may include any finance that you have outstanding, your repayment history in respect of those loans, and any defaults. Usually, credit information is exchanged between credit and finance providers and credit reporting bodies.
The kinds of personal information we may collect about you include your name, date of birth, address, account details, occupation, and any other information we made need to identify you.
If you are applying for finance we may also collect the ages and number of your dependants and cohabitants, the length of time at your current address, your employment details and proof of earnings and expenses.

Why we collect your personal information

We collect personal information for the purposes of assessing your application for finance and managing that finance. We may also collect your personal information for the purposes of direct marketing and managing our relationship with you. From time to time we may offer you other products and services.
To enable us to maintain a successful business relationship with you, we may disclose your personal information to other organisations that provide products or services used or marketed by us. We may also disclose your personal information to any other organisation that may have or is considering having an interest in your finance, or in our business.

How do we collect your personal information?

Where reasonable and practical we will collect your personal information directly from you. We may also collect your personal information from other people such as your associates, banks, equipment suppliers, property agents, accountants and lawyers.

Do we disclose your personal information?

We may disclose your personal information:

Prior to disclosing any of your personal information to another person or organisation, we will take all reasonable steps to satisfy ourselves that:

  1. (a) the person or organisation has a commitment to protecting your personal information at least equal to our commitment, or
  2. (b) you have consented to us making the disclosure.

We may use cloud storage to store the personal information we hold about you. The cloud storage and the IT servers may be located outside Australia.
We may disclose your personal information to overseas entities that provide support functions to us. You may obtain more information about these entities by contacting us.

Direct marketing

From time to time we may use your personal information to provide you with current information about finance, offers you may find of interest, changes to our organisation, or new products or services being offered by us or any company with whom we are associated. We may use third party businesses to assist us in managing your account.
If you do not wish to receive marketing information, you may at any time decline to receive such information by telephoning us on 0412-269722 or by writing to us at PO Box 547 Roseville NSW 2069.
If the direct marketing is by email you may also use the unsubscribe function or replying to the email to be deleted from further transmissions. We will not charge you for giving effect to your request and will take all reasonable steps to meet your request at the earliest possible opportunity.

Updating your personal information

It is important to us that the personal information we hold about you is accurate and up to date. During the course of our relationship with you we may ask you to inform us if any of your personal information has changed.
If you wish to make any changes to your personal information, you may contact us. We will generally rely on you to ensure the information we hold about you is accurate or complete.

Access and correction to your personal information

We will provide you with access to the personal information we hold about you. You may request access to any of the personal information we hold about you at any time.
We may charge a fee for our costs of retrieving and supplying the information to you.
Depending on the type of request that you make we may respond to your request immediately, otherwise we usually respond to you within seven days of receiving your request. We may need to contact other entities to properly investigate your request.
There may be situations where we are not required to provide you with access to your personal information, for example, if the information relates to existing or anticipated legal proceedings, or if your request is vexatious.
An explanation will be provided to you if we deny you access to the personal information we hold about you.
If any of the personal information we hold about you is incorrect, inaccurate or out of date you may request that we correct the information. If appropriate we will correct the personal information. At the time of the request, otherwise, we will provide an initial response to you within seven days of receiving your request. Where reasonable, and after our investigation, we will provide you with details about whether we have corrected the personal information within 30 days.
We may need to consult with other entities as part of our investigation.
If we refuse to correct personal information we will provide you with our reasons for not correcting the information.

Using government identifiers

If we collect government identifiers, such as your tax file number, we do not use or disclose this information other than required by law. We will never use a government identifier in order to identify you.

Business without identifying you

In most circumstances it will be necessary for us to identify you in order to successfully do business with you, however, where it is lawful and practicable to do so, we will offer you the opportunity of doing business with us without providing us with personal information, for example, if you make general inquiries about interest rates or current promotional offers.

Sensitive information

We will only collect sensitive information about you with your consent. Sensitive information is personal information that includes information relating to your racial or ethnic origin, political persuasion, memberships in trade or professional associations or trade unions, sexual preferences, criminal record, or health.

How safe and secure is your personal information that we hold?

We will take reasonable steps to protect your personal information by storing it in a secure environment. We may store your personal information in paper and electronic form. We will also take reasonable steps to protect any personal information from misuse, loss and unauthorised access, modification or disclosure.

Complaints

If you are dissatisfied with how we have dealt with your personal information, or you have a complaint about our compliance with the Privacy Act, you may contact our complaints officer, Wade Oldham, on 0412-269722.
We will acknowledge your complaint within seven days. We will provide you with a decision on your complaint within 30 days.
If you are dissatisfied with the response of our complaints officer you may make a complaint to the Privacy Commissioner which can be contacted on either www.oaic.gov.au or 1300 363 992.

Further information

You may request further information about the way we manage your personal information by contacting us.

Change in our privacy policy

We are constantly reviewing all of our policies and attempt to keep up to date with market expectations. Technology is constantly changing, as is the law and market place practices.
As a consequence we may change this privacy policy from time to time or as the need arises.
You may request this privacy policy in an alternative form.
This Privacy Policy came into existence on 5th March, 2014