Audit Insurance – a small fee you’ll 100% value.
You’ve seen the news. The ATO is continuing to crack-down, and hard. They are increasing their auditing each year across a broad range of industries. Audits can occur as a part of an industry wide crack-down, as part of a random requirement, or importantly where a suspect fraud or tax evasion is suspected.
“The Australian Taxation Office is maintaining its scrutiny of businesses in 2018, with reports it has recouped more than 1.8 million from smaller operators after a series of random audits across some Melbourne suburbs late last year.”
Don’t go for the panic button when the tax office sends you an audit notice. As of July 1st 2018, Highview clients will be covered under our company-wide Audit Insurance* policy.
As a Highview client you have always had the option of individually paying for Audit Insurance and we’ve encouraged this strongly. However, we do understand that to many it seemed a rather large fee to pay annually. We’ve found some clients took up the option to rest assured, but many did not. Then along came some unexpected ATO audit notices – and without Audit Insurance in place – we’ve seen many clients be up for thousands of dollars in fees on top of the ATO penalties. We have had enough. An audit can be quick and easy, or it can require in-depth research, meetings and file collaboration – fees all of which you, the client, is responsible for paying.
We want to protect our clients from these large fees that can be associated with audits. Highview has taken out a comprehensive company-wide Audit Insurance Policy on behalf of our entire client base. This means as a Highview client you are automatically insured for tax audits & reviews, and for work completed by Highview Accounting & Financial on your behalf. Importantly, you are ONLY COVERED if you have lodged your tax returns by the ATOs deadline. With the ATO’s wooden spoon swiftly swinging away, there’s been no better time for us to make this change and ensure our clients don’t get struck with huge and unnecessary auditing fees.
How does this impact you? We’ve added a small fee of $5 per individual tax return, $20 per sole trader/partnership and $50 per business tax return to our invoices to cover the cost of this company-wide insurance policy.
If you are currently paying a separate Audit Insurance policy, you won’t need to continue this, as you will be covered under our new policy.
We think this is a very small price to pay for peace of mind, and we hope you see the value it offers you as Highview client.
Should you have any further queries about this Audit Insurance policy, please contact your local office:
Cranbourne: 03 5990 1000
Prahran: 03 9529 1566
Mornington: 03 5911 2100