ATO (tax office) payments by credit card

[PLANT]

Note to accountant.... Can claim the champers for the ATO credit card payment 8yr B'party?

 

[cove]

Interesting thought Plant seeing I am working on my tax papers tomorrow. I remain respectful of the ATO so I stay within the rules. I must say we have 4 family members paying bills we get from the fiscal fiend. I do wish our personal tax rate could be more reasonable but now that Australia has a rag tag bunch of pollies it is going to be very, very difficult to fix the system.

 

[cove]

How about watchcat expenses Plant?
I am guessing no.
If my life was different I start wondering what it would be like not having ATO to pay so often. But then again I would not have succeeded in running up so many points and miles.

 

[ozflier]

I have some tax bills to pay in March and looked to see if my current credit cards can be usefully used to pay and get some qantas points.
It looks like the pickings are slim indeed.
Visa/Mastercard involve an Australian Tax Office surcharge of 0.54% and Amex 1.45% so need to be good reason to use Amex.
According to this article
https://www.ausbt.com.au/the-best-credit-cards-for-earning-points-on-tax-payments-in-2017 , there are few cards now that give points or at least full points.
· Some CBA
· Westpac Altitude Black American Express
· St. George Amplify Signature Visa
· Qantas American Express Discovery, American Express Velocity Escape
I do not have these cards.
Has anyone recent experience of cards other than the above that pay full points on ATO payments?[/h]

 

[cove]

BW World runs 0.66 points per dollar to QF.
St George Amplify runs 0.75 per dollar to Kris Flyer or Virgin with a 10% birthday bonus.
Direct Amex branded cards tend to pay 0.5 points so paying 2.9 cents a point is too expensive.

 

[Heachem]

What about St George Amplify with Qantas points? I have just applied and have some tax bills coming up.

In the last 2 years I have used and cancelled QFF earn cards from HSBC, Macquarie, Qudos and Jetstar. I fell like when I join up they change their conditions of use within 3 month.
(BTW, Cove, you are a legend on this topic, I study hard and try to keep up, but remain in awe...)

 

[MelbMan]

I have some tax bills to pay in March and looked to see if my current credit cards can be usefully used to pay and get some qantas points.
It looks like the pickings are slim indeed.
Visa/Mastercard involve an Australian Tax Office surcharge of 0.54% and Amex 1.45% so need to be good reason to use Amex.
According to this article
https://www.ausbt.com.au/the-best-credit-cards-for-earning-points-on-tax-payments-in-2017 , there are few cards now that give points or at least full points.
· Some CBA
· Westpac Altitude Black American Express
· St. George Amplify Signature Visa
· Qantas American Express Discovery, American Express Velocity Escape
I do not have these cards.
Has anyone recent experience of cards other than the above that pay full points on ATO payments?[/h]

Did a trial payment last week using an AMEX Velocity FF card (the $349 a year version). They do pay points on the ATO but only 0.5pts per $.
So as Cove says not economic.

 

[ozflier]

Thank you for that good advice.

 

[PDog]

am trying to dump $250 of uchoose gift cards that expire at the end of the month but the ato payment site is down. Kudos to those who do this regularly (although I guess the returns are good!)

 

[JohnK]

Not been following all of this thread.

Are people paying tax bills using $100 Visa debit cards? And is there a surcharge for paying tax bills with Visa debit card? Tl

The tax bill is only $2,000-$3,000.

 

[PDog]

Not been following all of this thread.

Are people paying tax bills using $100 Visa debit cards? And is there a surcharge for paying tax bills with Visa debit card? Tl

The tax bill is only $2,000-$3,000.

the visa gift cards I have (uchose? they were a gift!) have a surcharge of 0.54%. My tax bill will be circa $10k (not due yet, I am PAYG but will have a CGT to pay) I am just using these cards (1x $50, 2x $100) before they expire by the end of the month

 

[albyd]

That should work - there will be a surcharge of 0.54% so ensure you reduce your payment amount to take that into account (ie $99.46) otherwise won't go through.

 

[JohnK]

That should work - there will be a surcharge of 0.54% so ensure you reduce your payment amount to take that into account (is $99.46) otherwise won't go through.

I guess the payment form will calculate the surcharge due so all we need to do is provide the amount to pay to make up the $100.

 

[PDog]

I guess the payment form will calculate the surcharge due so all we need to do is provide the amount to pay to make up the $100.

yup, I just had to go back and edit my payment about to $49.73

 

[shifty]

Is there a daily limit for ato with Bankwest or is it open to whatever your balance is?

 

[cove]

You can put your account way into credit as there is no limit. Same applies to Westpac Platinum Kris Flyer Amex (if you have one).

 

[cove]

If you don't have a Westpac Kris Flyer Amex because you either never had one or you cancelled it then you need to know it is no longer being issued in Australia. The Westpac Black Altitude Amex pays 0.75 Kris Miles per tax dollar so the cost per Kris Mile is up around 1.9 cents. Still viable but quite a bit more expensive than the 1.2 Kris Mile earn rate of the withdrawn card.

 

[Radio8tiv]

If you don't have a Westpac Kris Flyer Amex because you either never had one or you cancelled it then you need to know it is no longer being issued in Australia. The Westpac Black Altitude Amex pays 0.75 Kris Miles per tax dollar so the cost per Kris Mile is up around 1.9 cents. Still viable but quite a bit more expensive than the 1.2 Kris Mile earn rate of the withdrawn card.

With westpac's enhanced alltitude black you only get .6 KrisFlyer miles per dollar, so not a great option for KrisFlyer.

 

[cove]

Thanks for the update on that Westpac enhancement Radio8tiv. I haven't had to use that card for a long time as our family group use our Platinum Amex Kris Flyer cards from Westpac.They posted a chunk of Kris miles to us this week so I have rebuilt our stash. This month was a quarterly and a monthly so I used 4 CCs to get it all handled.
0.6 earn rate is 2.41 cents a Kris Mile and even with a 49% tax deduction (if you can) is still a painful cost.

 

[drsmithy]

I have an Altitude Black from the 100k signup offer.

I was under the impression you could switch back and forth between earning QFF points and Altitude points - does anyone know how to do this ? There's nothing obvious in online banking.