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BAS Agents are not a rose by any other name

"What's in a name? That which we call a rose By any other name would smell as sweet." – W Shakespeare Accepting William Shakespeare's view could lead to disaster for unwary business owners who fail to check the credentials of their "bookkeeper

Quite simply, if your bookkeeper is charging you for the provision of BAS services and they are not a registered BAS Agent or Tax Agent there will be no Safe Harbour protection for you from penalties imposed by the Tax Office. In the modern business operating environment, the person who codes your transactions and lodges your BAS needs to be a registered BAS Agent for you to enjoy several benefits – the most important being a Safe Harbour as a taxpayer.

A taxpayer who uses a tax agent or BAS agent will benefit from a safe harbour for certain Tax Office penalties in the following circumstances:

• where a false or misleading statement (including claims made on or excluded from your BAS) is made carelessly by your BAS Agent, provided that you as the taxpayer have taken reasonable care to comply with your tax obligations by giving your BAS agent the information necessary to make the statement, and
• where a document (such as a return, notice or statement) is not lodged on time in the approved form due to your BAS agent’s carelessness, provided you gave your agent the necessary information, in sufficient time, to lodge the document on time and in the approved form.

At a glance, other benefits of engaging a registered BAS Agent as your bookkeeper include:

• You can lodge a complaint against them with the Tax Practitioners Board (TPB) – see the “Lodge a complaint” option on the tpb.gov.auHome page.
• Registered BAS Agents are required to maintain current Professional Indemnity insurance policy (and the TPB do check).
• Registered BAS Agents have the same extended lodgement dates for BAS and IAS as your Tax Agent does which is great when you need that extra time to get the BAS done!

Know your bookkeeper is registered; a BAS Agent is an asset and should not be a liability. Go to the TPB Agent Register and type in either 88392009 or 90175003 in the Agent number field and click search to check OUR credentials right now!

Please know this: as practicing professionals, we don’t mind so much the name you give us, as much as knowing you value our services for the value they add to your business. If you are a client wanting to learn more about hiring a BAS Agent, feel free to visit Remote Bookkeepers.

Article contributed by Fiona Mac Lean & Coralie Kemp, Remote Bookkeepers