The Australian Taxation Office (ATO) is launching an online data mining offensive on online traders using eBay and The Trading Post websites during the last 3 financial years to catch tax cheats.
The ATO’s data matching program will target both individuals and businesses who have sold more than $20,000 in goods and services on the online selling sites, eBay or The Trading Post online.
If your business sells through eBay or The Trading Post, or you have an existing business and are making additional sales through these sites, then you need to include this income in your activity statement and/or tax return.
The ATO’s data matching program will detect where businesses that are under reporting or not reporting income generated from eBay and The Trading Post.
Tax Commissioner Michael D’Ascenzo encourages business owners who may have understated their taxable income in the last three years to make a voluntary disclosure.
“If you do so you will be treated fairly and benefit where applicable from significantly lower penalties. You can make a voluntary disclosure on this or any other matter by writing to the ATO – more details are available on the ATO website,” Mr D’Ascenzo said.
Tax Commissioner Michael D’Ascenzo said the ATO’s data matching program will ensure that businesses doing the right thing are not disadvantaged by unscrupulous vendors.
“The online data matching program is part of the ATO’s focus on encouraging high levels of voluntary compliance and addressing the issues raised by non-compliant behaviour,” Mr D’Ascenzo said.
“Data matching allows information from a variety of sources to be brought together and compiled, identifying individuals and businesses that are avoiding their tax obligations.
“Records will be matched against different identifiers such as tax file numbers, ABN’s, addresses and date of births which will improve the integrity of our data matching program.
“When information obtained from data matching is used in an audit or review, people will be given the opportunity to confirm or contradict the information found from the data matching.”
