The Best of 22 So Far... SME

Included sessions

SMSF 2022 Planning - Shirley Schaefer, BDO

Session 4A from the SA Tax Forum

The session provides an update to current SMSF rules, focusing on what practitioners need to do with their SMSF clients prior to 30 June 2022. Covering:

• Contributions – what can be done?
• Benefits/Pensions – do I need to consider TBA changes?
• NALE – do we need to consider this?
• Superstream – is SMSF admin still easy?

Dealing with difficult structures - Planning for the Future - Linda Tapiolas, CTA, Coper Grace Ward

Session 6 from the SA Tax Forum

When assisting clients on how to plan for the future, one usually begins with the end in mind, which incorporates focus on the “planned end” like a trade sale or family transfer while maintaining flexibility for the unplanned. Care needs to be taken when doing the ground work to ensure that clients can maintain and realise value both now and in the future. As well as addressing most of the income tax rollovers and concessions that are useful to help restructure value, this session considers:

• Intellectual property, social media and ownership
• Managing valuation issues involving complex structures taking into account cases, affiliates and connected entities
• Whether Subdiv 328-G helps in these situations?
• Buyer versus seller considerations.

Preparing a business for sale - getting organised sooner rather than later -  Chris Dunne, CTA, Grant Thornton

Session 4A from the QLD Tax Forum

Whether they are buying equity or the business, potential buyers are increasingly requiring detailed information from vendors to assist in the evaluation of a business’s performance, risks and opportunities.

To equip advisers with the tools to assist clients in making the most of sale opportunities that might arise, this session provides attendees with practical tools to ensure clients are sale ready, including:

• How to approach a “vendor due diligence”
• Understanding factors that can influence valuations
• Financial performance considerations
• The importance of documentation
• Dealing with non-tax considerations including legal, commercial, technical, environmental, social and insurance.

Tax Governance for SMEs - what is it, what does it look like and why should your clients care? - Belinda Cheeswright, CTA, KPMG

Session 5A from the QLD Tax Forum

With an increasing emphasis on transparency, it is becoming more and more important for SMEs to understand what good tax governance looks like. This session explores:

• Brief overview of the Next 5000 and Medium and Emerging ATO private group programs and how tax governance fits within each of these programs
• What taxpayers in the SME market should expect in terms of the Commissioner’s expectations of their tax governance framework
• How SMEs can meet the Commissioner’s expectations

Transfer pricing for smaller taxpayers: Is there really a risk? - Natalya Marenina, BDO

Session 10A from the QLD Tax Forum

Transfer pricing (TP) is no longer an issue only relevant to the “big end of town”, with SMEs increasingly involved in arrangements and transactions that involve transfer pricing. As we open up for business at home and abroad, this session focuses on identifying when TP may be a risk for SMEs and how to manage that risk, and discusses:

• Why and when TP becomes important for start-ups, entrepreneurs and SMEs
• How to make sure your TP approach is right for your business from the start and will develop in step with your company
• Expansion requires funding: how to effectively structure the cross-border loans from a TP perspective
• Key TP risk factors to be aware of and what to do to reduce the ATO’s attention.

Fixing a Division 7A mess - Matthew McKee, FTI, Brown Wright Stein

Session 1A from the NSW Tax Forum

This session will examine the issues that occur where a Division 7A problem arose in a prior year, and it will consider the following:

• Typical scenarios where Division 7A problems may occur undetected
• Identifying a Division 7A problem
• What to do about the Division 7A problem
• The process and approach to seeking the Commissioner’s discretion under section 109RB to disregard a deemed dividend.

Division 7A - Keeping it tidy - Greg Travers, CTA, William Buck

Session 2A from the NSW Tax Forum

This session covers what action and documentation is necessary, and when this documentation and action are required to ensure that you have managed to keep Division 7A at bay. This session addresses the key issues of:

• These wretched old UPEs – are they debt? Do Unpaid Present Entitlements (UPEs) “morph” into debt? Can UPEs be tidied up? What if the trust has run out of assets?
• Timing of recording of dividends
• Dealing with journal entries
• What about old loans, that old chestnut?

Taxing the home - CGT and land tax considerations - Jim Koutsokostas, CTA, Hall & Wilcox

Session 4A from the NSW Tax Forum

For many, the family home represents a significant source of wealth, but the CGT and land tax rules applying to the family home are not necessarily straightforward. This session covers a number of key tax considerations of holding and disposing of the family home, including:

• A refresher on the CGT and land tax concessions
• Moving overseas – are the CGT and land tax concessions available, and will surcharge land tax apply?
• Application of the rules when moving homes
• Generating income from the family home, and absences
• The family home as an asset of a deceased estate.

Trusts distributions - Dung Lam, CTA, West Garbutt

Session 5A from the NSW Tax Forum

The ATO’s renewed focus on section 100A has put trust distributions in the spotlight, particularly the scope of the income-splitting advantages of a discretionary family trust. While it is important to be aware of the ATO’s position on section 100A, there are other relevant issues concerning trust distributions, which are important to be aware of since they are also generally raised in ATO risk reviews.

This session examines not only the current public draft ATO guidance provided in relation to its application of section 100A on family trust distributions and its views of the ordinary family or commercial dealing exception, but also:

• The impact of the family trust election rules on trust distributions – in particular the issues that may arise on marriage breakdown, death or addition to the family
• Responding to ATO queries concerning the source of overseas settlements of corpus
• Managing the particular tax attributes and interactions of foreign income, gains and foreign beneficiaries, through either resident or nonresident trusts.

Intergenerational wealth transfer - Bernie O'Sullivan, CTA, Sladen Legal, Will Monotti, Sladen Legal

Session 10A from the VIC Tax Forum

The value of wealth transfers in Australia more than doubled between 2002 and 2018 according to the Productivity Commission and it is estimated to continue to increase significantly in the next decade. When clients are contemplating wealth transfers there are a number of considerations to be aware of spanning tax and estate planning with balancing family objectives, tax planning and asset protection all being essential elements of the process. In this session we discuss:

• Key changes in the landscape of intergenerational wealth transfer in recent years
• Understanding your client’s structure, where control lies and what assets are actually owned
• Protecting wealth from relationship breakdowns down the lineal line
• Transitioning control of the family business – particularly when it operates via trusts and
• Gift and loan back – a viable strategy?