The Australian Tax Office (ATO) has warned that they have their eyes on big spenders. No matter what purchase – your luxury goods purchases must match your declared income.
Anyone who are attempting to fool the ATO are warned. Data matching technology is sophisticated and will uncover any discrepancies in your tax filings.
Taxpayers should be aware that their assets must match their declared income on their tax return or else the ATO will start noticing and asking questions. Although the ATO still reinforces that genuine mistakes will be forgiven and encourages people to respond before action is taken.
Currently the ATO has about 300,000 people under watch who have spent a large sum of money on items such as cars, boats and fine art. This is to investigate whether anyone is hiding income or claiming a little more on deductions. The ATO also watches closely on anyone disposing of their assets for capital gains.
Some may be worried that the ATO has too much information and the watchful eye is similar to ‘Big Brother’ but the ATO is only interested that people are being honest.
ATO Assistant Commissioner Tim Loh says “We want people to do the right thing — it’s really important that the taxpayer correctly meets their obligations.”
With access to a wide variety of sources of information, it will be likely that not only those who are super wealthy will be caught out. The worry is with so much digital data allowed to the ATO to utilise, at what point is their access to information too much?
Due to the increased efforts of catching tax evasion, the ATO could be overlooking other important things for everyday Australians when it comes to lodging their tax returns. Things such as providing information to the public when filing tax returns could help prevent accidental misinformation.
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