Month: February 2026

Payday Super & Qualifying Earnings

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From 1 July, under Payday Super, super will be calculated on qualifying earnings (QE).
As an employer, you currently calculate and pay super on your employees’ ordinary time earnings.
However, from 1 July, you’ll need to calculate it on their qualifying earnings, or ‘QE’ for short.For many employers, this won’t change how much super you currently pay to your employees, but you’ll have to report QE and super liability in Single Touch Payroll.
Source: Australian Taxation Office

2025–26 Instant Asset Write-off Limit

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Find out if your business is eligible for the $20,000 instant asset write-off for the 2025–26 income year.
Have you purchased, upgraded or are you purchasing an asset?
If your business has an aggregated annual turnover of less than $10 million, you may be able to use the instant asset write-off (IAWO) to immediately deduct the business portion of the cost of eligible assets which cost less than $20,000.Eligible assets must have been first used or installed ready for use for a taxable purpose between 1 July 2025 and 30 June 2026. The $20,000 limit applies on a per asset basis, so you can instantly write-off multiple assets.
If an eligible small business has previously claimed a deduction for an asset’s cost under the simplified depreciation rules in an earlier income year, they can also immediately deduct the first improvement cost for that asset. This applies as long as the improvement cost was incurred between 1 July 2025 and 30 June 2026 and is less than the $20,000 limit.
The IAWO can be used for both new and second-hand assets; some exclusions and limits apply. It is only available to eligible small businesses that use the simplified depreciation rules.
Assets costing $20,000 or more can continue to be placed into the general small business pool and depreciated at 15% in the first income year and 30% each following income year.

The usual rules for claiming deductions still apply, and you must have records to prove your claim.

Source: Australian Taxation Office

Self-education Expenses

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Eligibility to claim self-education expenses

You can claim a deduction for a self-education expense if, at the time you incur the expense, it has a sufficient connection to earning income from your employment activities.

Self-education has a sufficient connection to earning your employment income if it either:

  • maintains or improves the specific skills or knowledge you require for your current employment activities
  • results in, or is likely to result in, an increase in your income from your current employment activities.

Expenses you can claim

If your self-education expenses meet the eligibility criteria, you can claim a deduction for the following expenses:

For self-education expenses incurred before 1 July 2022, you generally can’t claim the first $250 of expenses.

Source: Australian Taxation Office