Your business records must contain enough information for you to be able to accurately calculate and substantiate the income you report in your tax return.
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Information your records need to show for your business's assessable income |
Examples of types of records |
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Gross sales and income from your business received in cash, online, using credit or debit cards or using EFTPOS. Other money received such as:
Other business transactions involving bartering or trade exchanges are subject to the same income tax and GST treatment as normal cash or credit transactions. |
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If you use cash register tapes, keep the full rolls of tape for:
- one month if you keep Z-totals and they have been reconciled with actual sales and the amount you banked
- 5 years if you don't keep Z-totals and reconciliations.
How long to keep tax return records
The records of the information you use to complete your tax return need to be kept for 5 years, starting from when you prepared or obtained the records, or when you completed the transactions the records relate to, whichever is later.
You should keep records long enough to cover the period of review (also known as the amendment period) for an assessment that uses information from the record.
Record keeping
| Steps | Progress | |||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Record keeping overview |
10 mins | |||||||||||||
Tasks and tips |
6 mins | |||||||||||||
Starting your business records |
2 mins | |||||||||||||
Digital record keeping |
5 mins | |||||||||||||
Manual or paper record keeping |
2 mins | |||||||||||||
Banking records |
2 mins | |||||||||||||
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Income records |
3 mins | |||||||||||||
Accounting for private use of assets |
9 mins | |||||||||||||
Motor vehicle deductions records |
2 mins | |||||||||||||
Home-based business deductions records |
1 mins | |||||||||||||
Other deductions records |
1 mins | |||||||||||||
Stock and asset records |
5 mins | |||||||||||||
GST records |
1 mins | |||||||||||||
Employee records |
7 mins | |||||||||||||
Car fringe benefits records |
1 mins | |||||||||||||
Expense payment FBT records |
2 mins | |||||||||||||
Contractor records |
2 mins | |||||||||||||
Sharing economy records |
1 mins | |||||||||||||
Cryptocurrency records |
1 mins | |||||||||||||
Records for other taxes |
5 mins | |||||||||||||
Sole trader structure records |
4 mins | |||||||||||||
Partnership structure records |
3 mins | |||||||||||||
Company structure records |
3 mins | |||||||||||||
Trust structure records |
1 mins | |||||||||||||
Changing your business structure records |
1 mins | |||||||||||||
Selling or closing your business records |
2 mins | |||||||||||||
Related courses |
1 mins | |||||||||||||
Course Feedback |
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