Australian listen up, here is a story that we have to know to understand how incompetent the ATO is. They give away our hard earn dollars to foreign backpackers for not working a single day in Australia.
News.com.au reports ....
FOREIGN backpackers have discovered a way of ripping off the Australian tax system to get free travel down under.
The fraud involves putting in fake income claims, which result in them getting thousand of dollars in tax refunds - despite not having worked. Knowledge of the lucrative fraud has spread by word of mouth through backpacker hostels in Australia and around the world. They know they will have left Australia by the time authorities discover the refunds should not have been made. The young travellers also know the amounts illegally obtained are small enough that it is unlikely to be cost effective for the Australian Taxation Office to bother pursuing them overseas. Most backpackers involved in the fraud get between $4000 and $14,000 in tax refunds they weren't entitled to.
Read full story: http://www.news.com.au/travel/story/0,28318,25267816-5014090,00.html
I don't understand how this is even possible. Doesn't the ATO cross check with the employer PAYG records to verify the TFN of the employees and the TFN of the person lodging the tax returns?
Well the answer is quite obvious isn't it? This is such an embarrasment to the ATO.
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