Filing taxes can be cumbersome but the penalties are severe for those that undertake tax evasion. Although they might seem trivial for a lot of students who don't earn the minimum threshold of $18,200, getting into the habit now will put you in great stead for the long run. Effective tax measures such as negative gearing and franking credits on dividends can be taken advantage of when paying taxes under the Australian system. Overall, the social benefit of taxes is substantial and allows citizens to engage in a higher quality of living, at least in Australia.

If you’ve already got a MyGov Account and an online ATO account, skip to step 8!

 

1)   Click on https://my.gov.au/LoginServices/main/login?execution=e2s1

2)   Follow through to creating a profile if you haven’t already, it’ll ask for your basic information as well as creating three questions which you will need to write the answers to (as a backup)

3)   The MyGov username will now be emailed to you on the email you listed in the form

4)   After logging in, there will be a screen to display all the myGov Services

5)   Click on the ATO link, it should be the second one on the list

6)   If you have an online ATO account, you can just type in your TFN to log in

7)   If not, you’ll have to select the “No” option which will lead you to create an online ATO account. Apart from asking basic information, you’ll also need to have ready a PAYG payment summary, a super account statement, a dividend statement or a bank account statement. Questions will be asked from 2 of these statements

 

8)    So after linking your MyTax with the MyGov account as above and subsequently logging into MyTax, you’ll first be asked to confirm your contact details

9)    Then there are a series of questions regarding income, investments, government payments and deductions. Some may already be filled by other agencies, which is the entire point of doing the returns online. A lot of the payments and deductions will have been pre-inputted into the system just waiting for your reconfirmation

10)                   Once you’ve ticked all the boxes, it’ll generate a return

11)                   You can then lodge this return or edit it by adding deductions, and there are numerous categories from which to choose those deductions from.

12)                   The return takes about 15-20 minutes to go through; it depends on the level of your income complexity at the end of the day

13)                   If it’s too complex, the system will generate an error message letting you know of this and will suggest alternative arrangements

14)                   Last date for generating a return is 31st of October!