TAX REFUND – Martine Joly Interview – Bilateral Solutions

Bilateral Solutions was created by Martine JOLY, who has a French « Expert Comptable – Public Practice » diploma and is a « Chartered Accountant » and a Tax Agent in Australia. While taxpayers need to lodge their tax return, we are proud to announce our partnership with Bilateral Solutions in order to always ensure a better support during your stay in Australia. You can benefit from a free MEDICARE refund by specifying on your tax return form that you are coming from Australiance !

What are the main differences between the French and the Australian individual’s tax system?

The first difference is the fiscal year. The French fiscal year starts on January 1st and ends on December 31st, whereas the Australian fiscal year starts on July 1st and ends on June 30th.

The second difference is that Income tax does not apply to a household but to each individual. The family income will not aggregate incomes as a single economic entity for purposes of tax filing but will consider every person as an individual for application of tax rates. This may lead to huge differences, especially if you consider, for example, a married couple with kids and only one earner of income. In this case the tax rates will apply to one individual as single person and will not apply to the entire family. There is no such thing as French income averaging with number of family members.

The third difference concerns the notions of gross and net wages. In Australia employees do not contribute on their wages to any social contribution. Social contribution is included on the income tax system by a universal contribution of 1.5% for MEDICARE. Nevertheless, the income tax rates are more important than in France. In fact, the income taxes are taken at the “source” and so the wages shown on your pay slip are a net wages after personal taxes. It is a lot simpler: the wages you receive each month are entirely yours, meaning that the taxes have already been paid. Even better, at the end of the year, you lodge a tax return and usually you always get a refund. When you fill in your annual tax return, you do not expect to pay any money like in France but instead you will usually receive within 14 working days, an amount of refund directly in your bank account.

When do we have to lodge your tax return?

Every taxpayer needs to lodge a tax return each year between July 1st and October 31st. You can lodge your tax return yourself or you can alternatively ask a Tax Agent to lodge on your behalf. Nevertheless, if you need to extend this normal period of lodgement for any reason and only a registration with a tax agent before October 31st will grant you the require extension of time for your compulsory annual lodgement.

Can you explain to us your activity of tax return?

Our core activity is historically assisting foreign companies when they set up their business in Australia. Tax return lodgement activity comes naturally as additional service after our company’s customers ask us to take care of their expatriate employees’ tax refund. From this, we put our service of tax return available to general public by offering a new online system on our Web Site. We think that it is important to simplify the access, you will find a form that everybody can fill: it is easy to understand and is very useful for us to determine your situation. Thanks to that, we can offer professional services at low cost as we are much more efficient.

What are the different steps for the online tax return process?

The online steps are quite simple. We have organised links to the official ATO website where you can find relevant information for your tax return in Australia. Thanks to these direct links, you do not waste time searching for the right information. For instance, there is a link to help you to determine your tax residency status, which is different from the immigration notion of residency.

If you want us to prepare your tax return, we have very attractive prices which are only fixed prices without any additional withdrawn % from your refund on top!

In this case, you just have to fill the online questionnaire about your details and your sources of income (yes/no). At reception we send you a quote for our fees and the list of documents that you need to provide us.

Then, you can pay online by credit card with the code given on your quote, which becomes a Tax invoice and will be deductible as tax management expenses on your next tax return.

We will prepare your tax return online and send it to you for review with your tax calculation. You will approve your tax return by signing and we will lodge it on your behalf… 14 working days later, you can expect to receive 100% of your tax refund, as estimated, by direct transfer from ATO to your nominated bank account.

For Working Holiday Visa holders, what is the average amount of tax return?

For Working Holiday Visa holders it is compulsory to do the test in order to establish their fiscal residency and to send the result of this test with their demand for an estimate.

They are two different cases concerning these visa holders, the one who has used more holidays’ side and the one who has used more the working’s side. Both will have their tax withdrawn on the way by employers at the compulsory rate of non resident.

On one hand, there are those who are more on holidays than really working. They will be considered as non resident and therefore they will receive from 300A$ to 800 A$ depending on the amount earned by the main fact that they will be entitled at least to a Medicare exemption.

On the other hand, there are those who have worked most of their time, have rented a dwelling, and may be registered in a local club or gym; these ones can be considered as local residents for tax purposes. Their employers have withdrawn their taxes on the way at the non-resident rate and the final taxation will be based on their local residency status, therefore their refund can often reach 2,000 A$ to 5,000 A$.