My husband is a tradesman and is set up as a Trust. We are (or were) paid wages by the Trust as well as superannuation. A few years ago due to difficult personal circumstances and illness which meant I was unable to work we fell into some financial difficulties and did not have the funds to pay our quarterly super payments. Due to extreme business inexperience on my husband's part and my complete lack of knowledge, we didn't realise the implications of this at the time and thought we could just catch up in our own time.
In January 2024 I went through and lodged all of the past super amounts with the ATO using the SGC spreadsheet and it came back with us owing $36k. We set this up on a payment plan but the only plan they would do for us was one with a balloon at the end as we were hoping to get finance at the end to pay it out. The finance fell through and in January 2025 I set up a new payment plan on a similar basis but they would only do it for six months and the person had said it would be fine to do the same again if we were unable to get finance to pay it out.
I've just got off the phone from the ATO and the person I spoke to today said it would not be possible to do the same payment plan again and they would have to do a capacity to pay assessment to get the "debt settled in a matter of months" not the years I had accounted for. Cue me bursting into tears as we simply do not have access to funds to pay $30k outright, and will not at any stage in the near future. I ended up asking enough questions to ask the person what length of payment plan he could approve for us and he said two years maximum, which I went ahead and set up for the time being because I don't have the capacity to make another phone call and go through the capacity to pay assessment in the next two days due to having sick toddlers at home with me this week and having to go to my own job. I asked for an extension of time to do it and he said no, just call back before Monday. No understanding of the fact that I actually don't have the ability to make a two hour phone call in business hours between now and Monday. I realise I should've started this process earlier, but I genuinely thought it wouldn't be a problem to just do a similar payment plan to the one we had before.
So now we have a new payment plan in place for two years and the instalments are three times what they used to be and this will be incredibly difficult for us to service given current business conditions.
I'm so overwhelmed by it all and honestly can't see a way out of this. I have a panic attack everytime I even think about calling the ATO. I just want to try and get straight what our possible options could be. Does anyone have any advice or experience with this kind of situation?
- We've previously applied to re-finance with our mortgage and take out $30k to payout the ato but this was declined as we are very undesirable self-employed applicants.
- Most banks don't want anything to do with a business loan that's for ATO debts. And also see above - undesirable self-employed applicants.
- I've even looked at our super funds to see if we can withdraw an amount. To then give that amount to the ATO. Who will then give it back to the super funds.
The whole situation seems pointlessly punitive. I understand the need for businesses to ensure they pay their staff super. But this isn't about other staff members. It's only about my husband and I. We don't have any other staff.
The ATO officer on the phone today said something about applying for remission of general interest I think to lower the amount but I was crying pretty badly by this point so I'm confused. I've looked back at the SGC statement from the ATO and it has nominal interest amounts on it but not general interest. We also didn't receive any penalties. Is it possible to apply to have the nominal interest remitted?
Do I have any other avenues I can explore?
If I send a letter to the ATO outlining all of this and begging for some kind of assistance do you think there's anything else they could do?
All of the financial hardship options with the ATO and super funds seem to be only available if you're at the point of foreclosure on your home. We're not, but I really don't want it to get to that point. The sheer toll of this stress on us and our family is devastating.
The only other thing I think I can do is go through the capacity to pay assessment and try to arrange a new payment plan with more affordable instalments over a longer time frame. But I got so spooked by his comments about settling this in a few months, I'm terrified of making the situation worse.
Overwhelmed in Sydney
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