Understanding Payday Super

Hello everyone. We've had a record turnout today, so thank you for joining us. My name is Andrew Ribeiro. I'm a Marketing Manager here at AustralianSuper and it's our great pleasure to host today's webinar on Payday Super, a very important piece of legislation that will affect employers right across the country.

I’d first like to, on behalf of all participants, acknowledge the traditional custodians of country throughout Australia and their continuing connection to sea, land, and community. We pay our respects to Elders past and present and extend that respect to all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples.

Today I'm coming to you from Sydney, the lands of the Gadigal people of the Eora Nation, and we're joined by other AustralianSuper presenters from right across the country. We're joined by Luke Fraser, who's the Head of Workplace Partnerships, Katie Pittman, who's a Senior Business Services Manager and Craig Wilson, Manager for Business Development B2B.

Before we begin, I'd like to draw your attention to some important information on this slide about today's session. The information is correct at the date of preparation and may be subject to change. The session may include general financial advice, which doesn't take into account your personal objectives, situations, or needs. I'll now hand over to Luke. Thank you.

My name is Luke Fraser. I'm the Head of Workplace Partnerships at AustralianSuper. The Workplace team provides services to over 480,000 businesses across many interesting industries, whether that's manufacturing, transport and logistics, technology, hospitality, agriculture and beyond.

Now Payday Super, well, it's certainly been on our mind for the last two years and with the implementation marching closer every day, we’re here to support businesses to navigate this new legislation.

Look, we've got a lot to cover today as we explore this new era of Payday Super, including the key changes, implementation in practice, as well as the potential impacts. How you can prepare as well as how AustralianSuper can support.

Then we'll open for Q&A. If you have questions while we go, please use the Q&A button at the top of the screen and one of our specialists will look to answer you. We will have time at the end for a few questions. We'll do our very best to get to as many as we possibly can. And if we happen to miss you, please reach out to one of our team members who can support you.

So, with all that said, let's get into it.

So that the superannuation landscape is undergoing a significant period of change. However, over the last 20 years I've been in the industry, there's always been change.

I remember when I first started, I would collect the checks from the mailroom. And pick up the contribution printed out from the fax machine, pages and pages of employee names and contribution amounts.

Then came Choice of Superfund legislation, which saw the introduction of clearing house systems and really the start of digitisation. The establishment of SuperStream and data payment standards followed and finally we saw Single Touch Payroll introduced.

We're on the cusp of a new era now ushering in the largest transformation to date.

This includes the implementation of Payday Super which sees payment of super contributions move from quarterly to align with every payday. We also see SuperStream version 3 which brings new enhanced data standards, smarter error messaging, real time fund and real time fund validation to streamline payments and reduce mistakes. We also see new technology like the new payments platform or NPP, which drives real time payments.

So, all of this means that employers must adapt quickly to stay compliant. So upfront, I'm going to touch on the five key changes that we see and then I'll hand over to Katie and me later on. We'll unpack each one as we go.

So, the obvious one I've already mentioned, which is we see people or employers need to pay super at the same time as they pay wages as opposed to quarterly. Katie will run you through a few of the extensions that exist on that.

We also see the introduction of the new concept of quarterly qualifying earnings.

The third one we see is enhanced reporting requirements for Single Touch Payroll, meaning employers need to report qualifying earnings and the super liability to the ATO at the same time as salary and wages. The ATO will then use this STP data to monitor superannuation compliance in real time and compare it with the information received from super funds, who also have new reporting requirements.

We also see the introduction of the Super Guarantee Charge, which applies if super is not received by the fund in an allocable format within seven business days.

Then there are a range of SuperStream upgrades as well, and that coincides with the closure of the ATO Small Business Clearing House.

The key SuperStream changes include: the enablement of real time payment methods via the New Payment Platform, a new error messaging framework which will support faster and clearer error messaging when submitting contributions. We see the new member verification capabilities come in for first time contributions. Through the new member verification request functionality, we also see the fund validation service improvements with early alerts on fund changes like mergers, which we know are a source of frustration for payroll now.

So, to unpack each one of them, I'll hand over to Katie and I'll be back soon. Over to you, Katie.

Thanks, Luke. My name is Katie Pittman. Now today we're going to walk you through those five key changes under Payday Super. Now, by the end of this session, we really want you to have a clear sense of what you need to do next, what to keep an eye on early, and where to go if you need any support along the way. So, let's get started.

Now the first big change kicks in from the 1st of July 2026 and it's a fundamental shift in how super is paid. So, under Payday Super employers will be moving from paying super quarterly to paying it every payday. So that means that super needs to be paid and received by the employees' super fund within seven business days of paying wages.

Now this is a significant change, so let's break down what it actually means in practice. At a simple level, the rule is this that every time you run payroll, you'll also need to pay super and that super payment must reach the employee’s super fund within seven business days of payday. Now you're going to hear this referred to as the qualifying earnings day or QE day, but the key thing to remember is the outcome here. That contribution needs to be received by the fund and ready to be allocated to the member within that seven-day window.

So, this is where the data really matters. If the information you submit is incomplete or incorrect and that payment gets rejected and it can't be allocated, that deadline might not be met unless you can amend the error and return it quickly.

Now, as Luke hinted, there are a few exceptions to this seven-day rule, and the main one is for new employees, or you have employees who change their super funds during their employment. So, in those situations, whether you're contributing to that fund for the first time, you'll have up to 20 business days to make the payment. So that extra time there is just to allow for any account setups to make sure the details are right as well. Now extensions will also apply in certain circumstances, so things such as natural disasters or when a fund becomes non-compliant or temporarily unable to accept contributions.

Now a business day. We talk about these seven business days. A business day is any day that isn't a Saturday, Sunday or a public holiday for the whole state or territory. So, you might have a holiday that only applies for part of the state. So, a metro public holiday like the Royal Hobart Show Day, that will still count as a business day.

Now one last thing to keep front of mind, that payment is only considered on time when the fund receives it and not when you actually send the payment. So, it means that you'll need to factor in your clearing house processing times because those late payments may trigger the Super Guarantee Charge.

Now the second key change on the Payday Super is this concept of qualifying earnings or QE. Now qualifying earnings is a new term for the payments that you'll make to employees that count towards calculating their Super Guarantee under Payday Super. So, what exactly are qualifying earnings?

So qualifying earnings is bringing together a number of different payments and terms. So, things such as ordinary time earnings, which is already what the current Super Guarantee is calculated on, also includes salary sacrifice. So, if you have an employee who's sacrificing part of their salary to super and that would qualify as qualifying earnings had they not been sacrificed to superannuation. Also, all commissions paid to employees are part of qualifying earnings. And lastly, it's going to be an expanded definition. So, earnings paid to workers that are captured under this expanded definition of employee. So, a good example is independent contractors who are paid mainly for their labour.

Now what you'll find with qualifying earnings is that sometimes a payment might fit into more than one category of qualifying earnings. So, for example, you might have a commission that's also considered part of ordinary time earnings. So, in those cases, that payment is on the counts of one, so no need to double up when calculating the super there.

Now for most employers, and we really want to stress this, that move to qualifying earnings away from ordinary time earnings won't actually affect how much super you're already paying for your staff. However, with these changes, it's really important to start reviewing your payroll systems now and cross-check employee contributions to ensure that the correct Super Guarantee rates and amounts are applied.

Now with the introduction of Payday Super, the third key change we're seeing is how employers will need to report their superannuation information. So previously you would have reported either ordinary time earnings or super liability for that employee through your single touch payroll. However, under these new changes, employers must now report both qualifying earnings and the super liability for each employee through single touch payroll.

Now this change is quite important because it ensures that the super contributions are calculated accurately for each and every pay cycle and not just at the end of the quarter. Now to get ready, you need to make sure that your payroll systems can capture and report these qualifying earnings and super liability through your single touch payroll.

Now let's take a look at enforcement and compliance. What's required to stay on track and what happens if you don't. So, this fourth change and probably one of the bigger ones we're seeing in the Payday Super changes is how penalties are going to apply when payments are late or incorrect. So, this is where the Super Guarantee Charge or as we love an acronym, the SGC comes in, so let's break down what that means.

Now the Super Guarantee Charge applies if you don't pay the minimum Super Guarantee amount in full and on time, or if you don't follow fund choice rules. So, under Payday Super, this is now going to apply per payday and not quarterly. Now that Super Guarantee Charge is calculated over four parts. So, the first thing will be the unpaid super amount after any late contributions, the second being an interest charge on any unpaid super. Third is an extra admin charge which is generally based on compliance history and lastly a choice loading if you didn't follow your employee's choice of fund.

Now with Payday Super, the penalties have also increased. So, the ATO is going to calculate your Super Guarantee Charge and if you don't pay, you could face penalties of 25% or up to 50% if repeated. So previously the Super Guarantee Charge would apply quarterly. However, from the 1st of July 2026, it's going to apply every payday if deadlines aren't met, and it's going to mean that your payroll systems and processes need to be ready for these faster payments.

Now a big question we've been getting from employees so far is that are there any concessions or grace periods for businesses, especially during this first year of Payday Super? Now the ATO has released a practical compliance guideline for that first year of Payday Super and it gives us a clear indication of how they're going to approach compliance when this change comes in. Unfortunately, there's no formal exemptions for small businesses. These rules apply to everyone across the board.

And most importantly, the ATO has been clear that they're going to take a facilitative, common-sense approach in this first year. They're going to use a risk-based triage model. So really what that means is they're going to focus their compliance activity on higher risk behaviour rather than trying to order everyone at once. So, if your business is considered low risk, you're far less likely to be a priority for any compliance action.

So, the next obvious question would be, what would make me low risk? Now from the ATO's perspective, low risk employers tend to have strong governance and fit for purpose payroll and super systems. Thirdly, they have processes that support paying super correctly and on time. And fourthly, they're actively preparing for Payday Super. So, in other words, they're really looking at employers who are making that general genuine effort to comply.

However, the ATO understands that mistakes can happen, so what really matters is how you're going to respond. If you fix errors promptly and demonstrate strong governance behind the scenes, you're going to stay in the low-risk category, and this is going to reduce the chances of audits and penalties.

So, the message is start preparing today. Those employers who are showing a genuine effort to comply, so things such as upgrading your systems, participating in any testing ahead of payday and documenting your transition will be treated leniently. Penalties will apply for late payments, but the ATO is going to consider intent and effort. So, number one, get across your payroll processes now and two, make sure you know how to respond quickly if errors do occur.

Now these first four changes we've covered the what's and some of these paid super rules, new terminologies and employer obligations. Now let's talk about how we're going to make that work in practice and we're going to talk through some of the improvements that'll hopefully make these obligations so they're easier for you to meet. So over to you, Luke.

Thanks, Katie. And really good to hear that the ATO is taking a more practical facilitative approach on compliance in the first year.

But one of the really important things from a Payday Super perspective is the key enabler of the New Payments Platform which will enable faster payments.

So NPP, another acronym, is Australia's modern payment infrastructure designed for fast, secure and data rich payments, and it's already part of everyday life. In fact, almost $7 billion moves through NPP each day. So, if you've ever sent money using pay ID or Osco, you've used NPP. The payment arrives in seconds, not days. It's quick, simple and available 24/7, including weekends and public holidays.

So, under Payday Super contributions made through payroll systems and clearing houses using NPP are likely to be received by the super fund sooner than other payment method methods, and this ultimately helps reduce delays.

So, looking ahead from 1 July 2026, all super funds like AustralianSuper must be able to receive NPP payments. Employers like you on the call today will also be able to work with your digital service providers or clearing houses to decide whether you can use NPP for making contributions.

Another great feature that is being rolled out as part of Payday Super is called the Member Verification Request or again MVR. It will help employers check if an employee super fund is ready to receive payments before the money is sent by the employer.

Before making a contribution, your payroll system or clearing house can send a quick message to the super fund and the message checks that the funds unique code or as we call it in the industry, unique superannuation identifier is valid. That the fund is open and able to accept payments, and it also checks whether the employee's details like their name and date of birth match what the super fund has on record. If there's a problem, you'll find out straight away so that you can fix it before you send the payment. So, this means fewer mistakes, less chances of payments being rejected, and helps you meet the tighter deadlines under Payday Super.

To help bring the importance of this feature to life, I was at a Payday Super conference a few weeks ago and some of the industry experts were suggesting that if the MVR existed today, there would be a 90% reduction on the existing areas that occur in the ecosystem.

So needless to say, it's important for you to check with your payroll provider or clearing house provider or super fund whether they will have MVR built and enabled by 1 July 2026.

Now talking about errors, I'm going to hand back to Katie, who's going to take you through the new error messaging framework. Over to you, Katie.

Thanks, Luke. So, another Payday Super functionality on the way will be enhanced error messaging. So, error messages are getting clearer and more helpful when you pay super.

So, in the past, if you had a problem with a super payment, you might get a vague message like data element contained an unexpected value and it's made it really hard to know what's gone wrong. Now the new system is going to give you specific messages. For example, if you forgot to enter a surname, the message will say surname is mandatory and must be provided. Now these clear messages are going to make it much easier to fix mistakes quickly and ensure that any payments aren't delayed.

Now there's also going to be three different types of error messages. So, number one, you'll have an error message where this must be fixed before you can submit your payment. You'll also possibly get a warning. So, this one says that it needs fixing to meet compliance, but you might find the payment still goes through. And lastly, information. So, this one's just a warning or some information you need to know, but it won't stop the payment going through.

Another major improvement will be also an upgrade to the fund validation service. So, this is an ATO service that sits behind a clearing house or your digital service provider and acts like a real time directory of superfund details. So, before a contribution will be sent, the service will be checked to make sure that the fund and product details are correct and up to date, giving you early warnings about any key superfund changes. So, another one being mergers to avoid any contribution issues or rejections.

The big message we want to say is I want to encourage everyone to review the error and warning messages you're currently receiving through SuperStream for your existing staff. So be aware of where you can find them, because right now some of those payments might still go through, even if there's a warning or a minor issue.

However, once Payday Super kicks off, those same issues could cause payments to be rejected. By checking and fixing those ahead of time, you can avoid any surprises and reduce that risk of bounce backs and rejected payments once Payday Super is up and running.

Now let's focus on some of the practical impacts of Payday Super, especially for employees. There are just three key areas we want to focus on here.

So firstly, independent contractors. Now, even if they invoice you or have an ABN, you may be required to pay super for them. So, under Payday Super, they're going to be treated the same as other employees. So, any super contribution will need to reach the employees fund within seven business days of their payday or invoice being paid.

Secondly, contribution caps and timings. So, with Payday Super, up to 15 months’ worth of contributions in the worst-case scenario could fall into the next financial year due to this transition. So, this timing shift means there's a real risk of employees exceeding their super caps, which can trigger extra tax. So, it might be worthwhile communicating this ahead of time to your staff, especially high-income earners, as the ATO is going to send notices directly to employees if any caps are breached.

And another key change that we're kind of seeing come out through Payday Super is there'll be no more quarterly averaging or washing up of errors throughout the quarter instead of reconciling. Those every few months is going to become part of every pay cycle, so it means that those that are responsible for super will need to have some new checks in place so that errors don't slip through.

And finally, just a quick update on three contribution changes also effective from the 1st of July.

So firstly, the maximum contribution base, it's moving from a quarterly limit to an annual cap for the 2026/2027 year. So, once an employee's earnings hit the maximum contribution in a financial year, no further super contributions are required for the rest of that year. So, this change is going to simplify monitoring for any high-income earners and for those in payroll. So, you need to make sure that your payroll systems are updated, and any high-income employees are possibly informed if they're going to be affected by that change.

Secondly, allocation timeframes. So super funds currently have around 20 business days to allocate or return contributions. However, from the 1st of July 2026, that's going to drop down to three business days. So, what you're going to find is that your employees are going to get a faster visibility of the super being paid on their end and you'll also see quicker turnarounds and bounce backs if there's any reconciliation issues.

And finally stapled funds. So currently employees must provide employers with their choice of super fund when they start and if no choice form is received, then go and request stapled fund details from the ATO. However, from 1st of July 2026 employers can actually request that stapled fund and offer it as well to the employee at the same time you prefer the choice to them. So, this is going to streamline your onboarding and hopefully reduce delays in setting up contributions for that first time. And importantly, you'll still need to offer a choice of fund and follow the ATO process if the employee doesn't submit their choice.

Now that's all the changes we're seeing ahead of Payday Super and I'm going to pass back to Luke.

Thanks, Katie. Last one to round it out from me, the ATO Small Business Clearing House. Many of the people on the call, if you use it, you may have heard already that that will be closing from 1 July 2026. So, the Small Business Clearing House was that free service that the ATO provided to help small businesses meet their super obligations. To be frank, the platform was not going to be fit for purpose for a Payday Super environment.

So, if you're one of the 200 odd thousand employers using the clearing house. Firstly, don't worry because there's other options available, but if you're an existing user, really starting to explore and evaluate other solutions now is important. Don't leave it to the last minute. Look at what your payroll provider or your super fund offers and check their clearing house solution is Payday Super ready and has some of those features that we were talking about before.

So just to recap, I wanted to give you a few practical tips that might help you prepare. So, first and foremost, if you haven't started, that's OK, but now is the time to plan. Map out your key stakeholders, who your suppliers are, what your key dependencies are, and the main milestones. Consider things like your internal engagement, how you communicate with your employees. What your data quality looks like, what your systems are, and I'll touch on each of these briefly.

From an internal stakeholder engagement point of view, depending on the size of your business, this could include HR, payroll, IT and technology and finance teams. So, for finance, things like how are they actually going to make the payments? Who's going to be making them? What will the impact be for cash flow of more frequent payments if you're moving towards real time payments via NPP? You may need to speak to your bank so you can send and receive NPP payments and also check whether this requires any changes in access or delegations.

For technology, if you're going to be using new systems, what does testing and deployment look like and are there any process changes that are required?

For HR, you want to start reviewing your onboarding practices. Review your onboarding materials that mention payment cycles for superannuation. What do employee policies say? Things like employment contracts, enterprise agreements as well. How do you present choice of fund today, your default fund and your stapled fund? How are you going to present all of them in a Payday Super environment to ensure you're meeting the legislative requirements? Also consider how you capture and record choice of fund for new starters. If your process is manual today, really consider what digital options are available.

If you're using a digital onboarding provider like Katie mentioned, it's also important to be aware of legislative change on that front. So, the Treasury Laws Amendment Supporting Choice in Superannuation and Other Measures Bill 2025 was introduced last year. The framework proposes a ban on advertising superannuation products during onboarding. And introduces changes to how employers present an employee stapled fund. So, it's worth keeping across this for when the final legislation passes.

And if you’re using a third-party onboarding solution today, things that you might want to get familiar with include whether the platform currently advertises superannuation funds during that onboarding moment when the final legislation is passed, how the system will be updated to accommodate presenting an employee stapled fund during the choice of fund process. And lastly, how the platform will ensure it only advertises funds that have met the APRA My Super performance test from 1 July 2026.

Now, thinking about employees, take this opportunity to let them know about Payday Super and that it's coming and what it means for them. Let them know that it's going to likely mean contributions appear in their account more frequently. You also might want to send separate comms to higher income earners about the move from a quarterly contribution cap to an indexed annual threshold. You'll also want to let employees know how you plan to deal with the intersection between FY26, which is current rules, and FY27, which is Payday Super rules where they could see up to 15 months of contributions for in FY27.

From a data quality perspective, really take the time now to clean up your existing records. So even just purely your employee records, you know their personal information like name, date of birth, tax file number, address. Make sure this is recorded correctly in your payroll system or your HRIS system. Confirm the accuracy of each employees' super fund record, super fund name that's current, that you've got the right unique super superannuation identifier and that member numbers are correct, particularly where we've seen a number of mergers or funds close over the years, sot that's going to be really important for Payday Super.

And for clearing house and payroll providers, ensure your clearing house and payroll provider are going to be set up to be able to manage more frequent contributions and even yourself consider start paying in line with Payday Super now. It's important to start this dialogue with your payroll providers or clearing houses and understand when new functionality will be rolled out. So, we spoke about before the member verification request. I was at a conference a few weeks ago which I mentioned and people in the industry were saying that some providers are not going to have that feature available on day one. Confirm your payroll software will be able to report qualifying earnings and single touch payroll to the ATO at the same time. Confirm the deployment times and what changes you might need to make, and importantly, whether there's any costs that you need to consider.

Katie mentioned this before but start reviewing the SuperStream error messages that you get today. Right now, payments that you're making that trigger warnings might still go through, but after 1 July 2026, they could and are likely to be returned. Knowing where to check for rejected payment errors and how to fix them is important, so it'll either be your clearing house or your digital service provider that sends these today. Make sure you get familiar with that.

We've been talking a lot today. You're probably thinking, how's AustralianSuper going to help? Well, obviously we'll continue to communicate like this and run sessions like this to ensure everyone is well informed. We also have a Payday Super website that we'll continue to update. As new information becomes available, this is where you can access the Payday Super checklist that you see on screen. We also have a range of emails coming out that are due and scheduled soon to keep you informed along the way, so keep an eye on your inbox.

We have a national partnership and service team who are on hand to help guide you through the change and we've also invested really heavily into our employer tools. So, the Employer Portal is a major one of them and it's a one-stop shop for employers, which Craig will talk you through now. So, I'll hand over to you, Craig.

Thanks for that Luke. And thank you everyone for having me here today. And I'm really excited. I get the fun part today. I get to talk to you about how AustralianSuper can help support you through these changes. But I'm also a little nervous today as well. I know I've spoken to a few of the businesses online today and they're expecting big things from me. So, I'm hoping I can meet your lofty standards.

So, talking about lofty standards, I think this slide here goes to the heart of what we're about here at AustralianSuper and that's where we're more than a super fund. We're a real partner for progress for your business and we're committed to that delivering that world class domestic service and support. And we do that by having real people on the ground here in Australia that know payroll and compliance and know what it's like to run a business. But also, for that, we know you need other help like simpler, smarter digital tools and that's where our new Employer Portal comes in.

And really, you can break it down into two parts. Firstly, it's that clearing house to help you be compliant in making your super contributions, but it also has an onboarding solution to make sure you're capturing those fund choice details and make sure you're compliant with stapling.

Now we're providing this new Employer Portal platform at no cost for our registered employers. Once again, it goes to the heart of what we want to do. Our focus is on keeping things simple. We want to take complexity off your plate and allow you to focus on your business and your people.

Now the next slide here, it's a high-level overview of the benefits of our new Employer Portal, but I'm just going to focus on three points here. Firstly, the enhanced security with multi-factor authentication for you, the enhanced reporting, being able to track contribution and its progress. And also, the user-friendly interface, so that real time alerts and data validation that's going to reduce errors in time.

But what I'm most excited about is the digital onboarding solution that's integrated into the portal and which you can also have your own branding on as well. So, it's really simple rather than sending paper as you may have in the past, you'll send a link to your new employee, and this will request their tax file declaration, their bank account details and their super choice. And when that's in the Employer Portal, you can then download that and then upload that to your HR or payroll system.

Now the portal will also help you comply with stapling as it'll talk directly to the ATO.

And now here it is, drumroll, please let the trumpets blare. We just wanted to give you a little taste of our new Employer Portal to see what it's like. And show you the user-friendly interface and then how easy it is to navigate around the place and just to manage your super in a simpler way, all in a secure location.

Now, if you'd like to stay across what's coming next, you can scan the QR code on screen to be notified when the new Employer Portal opens. But also, if you have questions, you can scan the QR code, in which case we'll get back to you after the webinar on these.

Now that also gives us time to open to a few questions that we've been getting today. And let me just see what we've been getting in.

OK, now first question that I'll get to answer is it's around the ATO Small Business Clearing House and we've got here there's been a few businesses ask about you know with the clearing house finishing on the 30th of June, what should they do next? Luke, are there any suggestions you have for this and what assistance AustralianSuper can provide? Thanks.

Thanks, Craig. And it's a good question. I touched on this a little earlier, but I also did mention in the that there's nearly 200 odd thousand businesses still using the platform and you know, we've been engaging with the ATO, and I've seen their messaging change as well. They're moving from awareness to really encouraging people to act now because that platform will not work. Post 1 July and you do not want to be scrambling for a new solution then.

So, I would say act now, start your transition early. Don't wait until June 2026. Look, at what your alternatives are so that you can avoid any compliance risks and that last minute stress we know that comes with testing systems and the like.

So now there's a range of different options out there. First, you can check with your existing payroll software, so platforms like Xero, Myob, QuickBooks, Reckon and others generally have an integrated clearing house solution. Obviously, there may be costs involved with that people will want to consider, but that integration can be favourable.

We're a super fund. There are many other super funds. Craig has given you a prequel into what our new solution looks like, but we also have a current solution that will continue to operate as well. The super funds generally offer a free clearing house service but really, I'd really encourage you to interrogate what the features of those clearing houses are, whether they're going to be Payday Super ready and have some of the things that we've spoken about like NPP and MVR, is it all in one portal, those sorts of things.

And last, clearing houses do work directly with employers as well. So Superchoice, Click Super and many others in the market. If you have really complex payroll needs, some businesses may choose to engage them directly. Obviously again there is a cost associated with that, but we're here to help.

On the screen you can see the QR code, but that's probably what I've got, Craig.

Thanks for that Luke. OK, next question here. What happens if a super payment is returned or bounced back? And does that put employees at risk of penalties if it takes time to fix and resend? Now I’d like to even things up here. I'll hand that one over to you, Katie.

Thanks, Craig. So, this is a really common concern that we're hearing at the moment from our businesses. So, under Payday Super, the standard rule is that super needs to be received by the fund within those seven business days of payday and that time frame still applies even if a contribution is rejected or bounced back.

So, if the payment is returned, the expectation is that employers correct that error and resend it as soon as possible. So, the bounce back on its own doesn't automatically mean that you failed your obligations. What really matters is how quickly you act once you're aware that that's been an issue.

As mentioned earlier, there are some built-in exceptions, so for example, new employees or employees changing their super fund, they'll have an extended 20 business day turnaround for that first contribution. So those employees just need the time to obtain the right details or so they can pay through to the employee stapled fund in some circumstances.

However, as both Luke and I were talking about that positive change coming through is that member verification request. So that's really going to allow employee details to be validated before that first contribution is made. So, as we've mentioned around 90% of those errors, we see today that cause those bounce backs will be avoided once MVR is put in place. So, we're hoping that's significantly going to reduce any bounce backs altogether.

And as well, just to touch on that, the ATO has been clear, they're going to take that practical common-sense approach, so particularly during this transition. So, if you're paid in good faith, then try to correct any issues properly and kept records of it as well. Employers will be less likely to be penalised in those cases.

Thanks, KP. Now, next question. OK, I like this one. If an employer pays super on time, but there's a delay at the clearing house end, who's responsible and is the employer still at risk of a Super Guarantee Charge? Luke, I'll hand that one to you.

Thanks, Craig. And that's an interesting, you know, I think really important question, and I think for everyone that's still on the line, we want to be really clear about this that under Payday Super the legal requirement is that contributions are received by the fund within seven business days.

Now the clearing house is considered the employer's agent, so technically if the fund doesn't receive the money within the time frame, it can still be treated as late. Even if the delay happened after the payment left the business’ payroll ecosystem, so you've heard a lot today, clearing houses, funds, we've got processes in place to move contributions through quicker and from July funds will also have three business days to accept or return, helping minimise those delays. But yeah, it is the employer's obligation regardless.

I think from a reassurance perspective though, and Katie, you know you mentioned it there too, if you paid correctly and you've paid on time and that delay happens after it leaves the payroll or clearing house, the ATO has been clear that it doesn't intend to penalise employers, particularly in that first year of practical compliance, who fall short through no fault of their own. So that's that transitionary. period.

So, the ATO in the conversations we've had with them has been clear to say this isn't about catching employers out, it's about making sure that employers are making their contributions correctly at the right time from their end and keeping good records to be able to show that.

Thanks for that, Luke. OK, next question here.

What do employees need to do if a pay run falls across June and July? I might hand that one back to you again.

Thanks, Luke. What happened to evening it out Craig? Yes, I'm happy to take that one.

And I know employers will have a lot swimming around in their head. They've got, you know, pre-payday legislation. They might be paying quarterly or monthly. They got post-payday where they might be paying weekly to different cohorts and things like that, but this one's pretty simple.

What really matters, and the clues is in the name, it's the pay date. So, if the payday falls in June, it's treated under the current quarterly cutoffs. However, if the payday falls on or after 1st of July 2026, then Payday Super rules apply.

So even if that work period spans both June and July, there's no need to split the contributions based on when the work was done. It's all about that payday. Craig.

Thanks, Luke. OK, I think we've got time for one more question. Do bonuses or commissions paid outside the normal pay cycle get extra time under Payday Super? Just to show I'm not playing favourites, I'll hand this one to you, Katie.

That's great. So, bonuses and commissions paid outside that normal pay cycle can receive extra time under Payday Super. So, if that payment is considered an out of cycle payment, the super contribution is due within seven business days of the employees' next regular payday, so not the day the bonus or commission is paid. There's a little bit of flexibility there in those out of cycle payments. Just need to make sure that the super is paid by the next regular payday deadline.

Thanks for that, Katie. So very mindful of time here. Thank you once again for joining today. We understand that these are very significant changes that are happening around Payday Super and really glad you came here and help us let you understand these changes.

On that note, I will say we're always here to help. So please reach out if you do have any further questions.

Apart from that, thank you again for attending today.