Shared Services SA is in the process of finalising arrangements that will ensure client agencies are compliant with new Australian Taxation Office (ATO) requirements for third-party reporting.

The reporting obligations, Taxable payments annual report (payments and grants), seek detailed information from agencies about:

• total payments made wholly or partly to individuals or businesses for providing services
• grants paid to organisations that have an ABN
• payments made to overseas suppliers.

A new process for the capture of grant payment information has already been implemented and is running smoothly.

Following the success of a pilot, changes have been introduced within the Masterpiece Financial System to identify reportable payments for services. Data capture commenced on 1 July 2017.

The project team is now preparing to generate the first set of “live” reports for the period from 1 July to 30 September 2017, covering 17 government entities.

The first actual report to the ATO is due on 28 August 2018, covering the 2017-18 financial year.