Practitioner Reference · Updated 18 May 2026
The complete ATO lodgement calendar for Australian businesses and registered tax agents: BAS & IAS quarters, individual ITRs, company / trust / SMSF / partnership returns, FBT, TPAR, PAYG and STP — with both self-lodger and tax-agent concessional dates side by side.
Section 1 — BAS & IAS
Quarterly Business Activity Statement (BAS) dates are the backbone of the SME lodgement year. Three of the four quarters carry a standard ~4-week tax-agent concession; Q2 (Oct–Dec) is the exception because it already lands on 28 February after the Christmas pause.
| Quarter | Period | Self-lodger | Tax agent |
|---|---|---|---|
| Q1 | Jul – Sep | 28 October | 25 November Standard tax-agent concession (~4 weeks) |
| Q2 | Oct – Dec | 28 February | 28 February No tax-agent concession — already extended past Christmas |
| Q3 | Jan – Mar | 28 April | 26 May Standard tax-agent concession (~4 weeks) |
| Q4 | Apr – Jun | 28 July | 25 August Standard tax-agent concession (~4 weeks) |
Monthly BAS lodgers (larger businesses)
Businesses with GST turnover of $20 million or more are required to remit monthly. Monthly BAS is due the 21st of the following month — there is no tax-agent concession on monthly remitters. Smaller businesses can elect monthly remittance voluntarily (often to smooth cash flow), but the same 21st-of-month rule applies.
Section 2 — Individual ITR
The individual ITR deadline is one of the most misunderstood dates in Australian tax. The 31 October statutory date applies to self-lodgers — clients on a registered tax agent's lodgement program receive a staggered set of much later dates, driven by prior-year compliance and client risk profile.
Standard statutory ITR deadline for individuals not on a tax agent's client list at 31 October.
The default tax-agent program date for individuals, partnerships, and most trust clients added to the agent register on or before 31 October.
Available when the agent and client meet specific payment-on-time conditions; effectively extends 15 May by 3 weeks.
Clients with prior-year non-compliance, large taxable income, or recent ATO compliance action may be brought forward to 31 March or 28 February.
Agents can add new clients to their register up to 31 October without the client losing tax-agent concessional dates.
Section 3 — Entity Returns
Entity-return dates are staggered by entity size, prior-year lodgement compliance, and whether the entity has a taxable result. The ATO publishes the full bracket each year in its lodgement program — the table below shows the standard buckets.
| Entity / status | Due date | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Company — large/medium with prior-year compliance issues | 31 January | Brought forward for medium-to-large taxpayers (turnover >$10m) with poor lodgement history. |
| Company — medium taxpayer, taxable | 31 January | Medium taxpayers ($10m–$250m turnover) with a taxable result for the income year. |
| Company — medium taxpayer, non-taxable + new registrants | 28 February | Medium taxpayers with a non-taxable result, plus newly registered companies in their first full year. |
| Company — all others (small business) | 15 May | Default tax-agent program date for small business companies on the lodgement program. |
| Trust — staggered (same brackets as companies) | 31 Jan / 28 Feb / 15 May | Trust returns follow the same staggered profile as company returns — driven by trust size, prior-year compliance, and whether taxable. |
| SMSF — newly registered | 28 February | Newly registered SMSFs in their first lodgement year are due 28 February. |
| SMSF — all others on tax agent program | 15 May | Established SMSFs on a tax agent's lodgement program follow the 15 May default. |
| Partnership — self-lodger | 31 October | Partnerships not on a tax agent's program follow the same statutory 31 October date as individual self-lodgers. |
| Partnership — tax agent program | 15 May (staggered) | Partnerships on the tax-agent program follow the same 15 May default with the staggered higher-risk variants. |
Taxable status and turnover bands are assessed against the ATO's published thresholds each income year. Where an entity moves brackets (e.g. small to medium), the new lodgement date applies from the following lodgement-program cycle.
Section 4 — FBT, TPAR, PAYG & STP
Outside of BAS and ITR, several other obligations have their own calendar. Two catch operators out most often: FBT (which uses a year ended 31 March, not 30 June) and TPAR (which catches owner-operators who didn't realise they were required to report).
| Obligation | Self-lodger | Tax agent |
|---|---|---|
| FBT return (employer) Note: the FBT year runs 1 April – 31 March, NOT the income-tax year. Lodgement uses the year ended 31 March. | 21 May | 25 June |
| TPAR (Taxable Payments Annual Report) Catches building/construction, cleaning, courier, road-freight, IT, security, investigation, and surveillance industries paying contractors. No tax-agent concession. | 28 August | 28 August |
| PAYG instalment activity statement PAYG instalments are bundled into the BAS for quarterly remitters — same dates and same concessions as BAS. | Aligned with BAS quarter | Aligned with BAS quarter |
| PAYG payment summary annual report Replaced for STP-reporting employers by STP finalisation; remains relevant for non-STP arm's-length payments. | 14 August | 14 August |
| STP finalisation — normal employees Single Touch Payroll year-end finalisation declaration for arm's-length employees. | 14 July | 14 July |
| STP finalisation — closely held payees Closely held payees (e.g. family members of business owner) have a deferred STP finalisation date. | 30 September (or with ITR if later) | 30 September (or with ITR if later) |
| Monthly BAS (larger businesses) Monthly remitters (turnover ≥ $20m or elected monthly) receive no tax-agent concession on the 21st-of-month date. | 21st of following month | 21st of following month |
FBT trap — the year ends 31 March
The FBT year is 1 April – 31 March, completely offset from the income-tax year. Employers running car-fringe, entertainment, or expense-payment benefits need to capture March data in real time — back-reconstructing FBT records after 31 March is the #1 source of late-FBT-lodgement penalties.
Section 5 — Penalties
The failure-to-lodge (FTL) penalty is calculated in penalty units ($313 each, as of the current scale), with the unit count scaled by entity size. The penalty accrues per 28-day period, capped at 5 periods. Penalty units are indexed periodically — always confirm the current unit value against ato.gov.au.
| Entity size | Penalty rate | Per 28 days | Maximum |
|---|---|---|---|
| Small entity (turnover < $1m) | 1 unit per 28 days | $313 per 28 days | Max 5 units = $1,565 |
| Medium entity ($1m – $20m turnover) | 2 units per 28 days | $626 per 28 days | Max 5 periods = $3,130 |
| Large entity (>$20m turnover) | 5 units per 28 days | $1,565 per 28 days | Max 5 periods = $7,825 |
General Interest Charge (GIC) — separate from FTL penalty
On top of the failure-to-lodge penalty, the ATO charges General Interest Charge on outstanding tax owed. The GIC rate is set quarterly — currently around 11.34% p.a., compounding daily. Where a lodgement is late but no tax is owed, only the FTL penalty applies. Where tax is also outstanding, GIC runs from the original due date until the balance is paid.
The Commissioner has discretion to remit FTL penalty and (less commonly) GIC where the taxpayer was prevented from lodging by circumstances beyond their control — serious illness, natural disaster, bereavement — and took reasonable steps once the obstacle was removed. Document the obstacle, document the steps, lodge the remission application.
The 28 October / 28 February / 28 April / 28 July dates are what your clients see in the media. The dates you actually manage to are 25 November, 28 February, 26 May, and 25 August. Build the practice workflow against the tax-agent calendar — trying to clear everything by the self-lodger date burns hours no one is paying for.
Quarter 2 BAS (Oct–Dec) is due 28 February for everyone — there is no agent concession because the statutory date already accounts for the Christmas pause. Practices that don't pre-block February for Q2 BAS turnaround end up scrambling alongside payroll-year-end planning.
FBT is the easiest deadline to forget because the year-end doesn't align with anything else. Set a recurring 1 April workflow trigger to collect car-logbook, entertainment, and expense-payment data for every employer client. The agent FBT lodgement date is 25 June — but the data quality lives or dies in April.
The Taxable Payments Annual Report applies to building, cleaning, courier, road-freight, IT, security, investigation, and surveillance services. Owner-operator sole traders in these industries who paid even one contractor over the year have a 28 August TPAR obligation — and most don't realise it until the ATO sends a default-assessment letter.
The concessional dates only apply if the taxpayer is on the registered tax agent's client list with the ATO before the statutory self-lodger deadline (generally 31 October for individuals). The agent must have added the client to their register on the ATO tax practitioner portal. Late additions can knock the client back to self-lodger dates.
Being on the lodgement program means the client appears on the registered tax agent's ATO client list at the relevant cut-off (31 October for the income year). The agent must hold a valid registration with the Tax Practitioners Board (TPB), have current professional indemnity insurance, and have submitted the prior year's lodgement on time for that client (or the client is new).
Agents can add new clients to their client list up to 31 October and still claim concessional 15 May (or 5 June with payment plan) dates for those clients' ITRs. Clients added after 31 October generally lose the agent concession for that income year and revert to self-lodger dates (or the agent's higher-risk bracket).
Failure-to-lodge penalty units are scaled by entity size. Small entities (turnover under $1m) attract 1 unit per 28-day period. Medium entities ($1m – $20m) attract 2 units. Large entities (turnover above $20m) attract 5 units. Each unit is currently $313, with a maximum of 5 accrual periods.
Yes — tax agents can lodge deferral requests via the Online Services for Agents portal. The ATO grants deferrals based on reasonable grounds (illness, natural disaster, data loss). Note that even an approved deferral doesn't suspend General Interest Charge (GIC) on outstanding tax — only the failure-to-lodge penalty is held in abeyance.
Remission applications are made through Online Services for Agents (or by paper for individuals). The Commissioner has discretion to remit penalty where the taxpayer was prevented from lodging by circumstances beyond their control (serious illness, family bereavement, natural disaster) AND took reasonable steps to mitigate. Document everything — dates, evidence, and the steps taken once the obstacle was removed.
OneBookPlus tracks every client deadline by obligation type, flags missing prior-year lodgements, and rolls the calendar forward automatically — built for Australian tax practitioners and BAS agents.
Last reviewed and updated: by Bishal Shrestha
About the author
Founder & CEO, OneBookPlus
Bishal has over a decade of experience in digital marketing, web development, and small business consulting across Australia. Bishal has walked Australian tax-agent practices through ATO program dates and FTL-penalty exposure across BAS, ITR, FBT, TPAR and STP lodgements.
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