Important Changes for Employers who have new staff commencing from 1 November 2021
Super Choice Rules will be changed from the beginning of November 2021, and Employers will be required to undertake an extra step referred to as ‘Stapling’ when they have new employees commence and they don’t have a super fund. This change may require employers to request ‘stapled super fund’ details from the ATO. This aims to stop new employees having to pay extra account fees for unintended super accounts being set up when they start a new job.
What is ‘stapling’?
‘Stapling” is a key reform passed through parliament as part of the Treasury Laws Amendment (Your Future, Your Super) Act 2021.
A ‘stapled super fund’ is an existing super account of an employee that follows them as they change jobs. New employees will automatically keep their existing super fund (if they have one) when they start with a new employers, unless they choose a fund themselves.
What do employers Need to Know?
You may need to request stapled super fund details from the ATO when:
- your new employee starts on or after 1 November 2021
- you need to make super guarantee payments for that employee, and
- your employee is eligible to choose a super fund but doesn’t
You may still need to request stapled super fund details for some employees even though you don’t need to offer them a choice of super fund. This includes if your employees are temporary residents or they’re covered by an Enterprise Agreement or Workplace Determination made before 1 January 2021.
You and your representatives will be able to request stapled super fund details for your employees if you have full access to Online services for business ato.gov.au/onlineservices. You need to review and update these accesses to protect the privacy and safety of your employees’ personal information.
Employers must meet their choice of super fund requirements and any stapled super fund obligations by the quarterly due date or you may face penalties.
Get Ready..
To make sure employers are ready to request stapled super fund details, we suggest you check and update the access levels of your authorised representatives in ATO online services.
If an authorised representative doesn’t:
- have full access in ATO online services, they will need to have the ‘Employee Commencement Form’ permission in order to request a stapled super fund
- need to access this service, you should remove this permission for them to protect your employees’ personal information.
What do employers need to do from 1 November 2021?
Step 1: Offer eligible employees a choice of super fund
Employers need to give eligible new employees a Super standard choice form and pay their super into the account they tell you on the form. Most employees are eligible to choose what fund their super goes into.
There is no change to this step of employer super obligations.
Step 2: Request stapled super fund details
If an employee doesn’t choose a super fund, employers may need to log into the ATO’s Online services and go to ‘Employee Super Accounts’ to request their stapled super fund details.
The ATO will provide the employee’s stapled super fund details after they have confirmed that you are their employer.
If the ATO provide a stapled super fund result for an employee, employers must pay their super using the stapled super fund details the ATO have provided.
Step 3: Pay super into a default fund
Employers can pay into a default fund, or another fund that meets the choice of fund obligations if:
-
- the employee doesn’t choose a super fund, and
- we have advised you that they don’t have a stapled super fund.
Click here to find out more about the new stapled super fund rules or
Contact our office for further clarification or assistance 9594- 1963
N.B Flowchart diagram shared from BT as a form of reference for clients
