Single Touch Payroll (STP) - what is it

For the ATO's version - see this ATO Website

Single Touch Payroll is a system designed to replace the need to provide Payment Summaries and lodge an EMPDUPE file with the ATO. Instead after each payroll payment an employer (Payer) is required to electronically send all the same information (and more) to the ATO. Reporting a Payroll Payment is known as a STP Pay Event.

What Information is Sent:

Single Touch Payroll consists of 2 streams of Data sent as one package:

Payer Data - used to pre fill your Activity Statement - this is the Total Gross and Total PAYG for this payroll transaction (Pay Event). These are the amounts you would show on your Activity Statement W1 and W2 labels for this payroll transaction. The W2 amount lets the ATO know how much to expect in your next Activity Statement payment for tax withheld from employees.

The ATO will aggregate the Total Gross (W1 amount) and the Total PAYG (W2 amount) for all Pay Events lodged and will use this to pre-fill your next online Activity Statement. Note that if you inadvertently lodge the same Pay Event twice, or miss a Pay Event, the pre-fill on your next Activity Statement will be incorrect. You will need to override the pre-fill and enter the correct amounts on your Activity Statement. There is no provision to correct the Total Gross Pay (W1 amount) and the Total PAYG (W2 amount) reported by STP on the Business Portal

Payee Data - used to pre fill your employee's Income Tax Return - Each STP Report you lodge (whether it is a Pay Event or an Update Event) includes Year to Date totals for amounts paid to each employee (Payee). This data will appear on the Income Statement in the Payee's MyGov account.

Each STP Report you lodge replaces all previous Year to Date Totals for this payroll year for each Payee included in the current STP Report. So if there was an error in an earlier STP Report, or you missed submitting a report, provided your next STP Report has the correct Year to Date Totals, this will ensure the correct figures are shown in the Payee's MyGov account.