Tax professionals conversations livestream 12 September 2018Check against delivery

VLAD DUGANDZIC: Good afternoon, and welcome to all of our tax professionals joining us today for today’s live webcast. My name is Vlad Duganzic and I will be your host today as we cover a number of topics including the Practitioner Lodgment Service, Online services for agents and where that is up to at this stage and particularly how that has been in beta testing over the last few months and on top of that one of the focuses we will have will actually be on agent compliance. I understand we have done a bit in the last couple of webcasts, but this is all going to be about ensuring a level playing field for the tax practitioner community. As part of that discussion we will be looking at the future role for tax agents and this will be particularly interesting to hear from you about what you see your future roles will look like, on top of what our esteemed panelists will have to say on the matter. 

A particular welcome to those tax practitioners joining us to the very first time today. We hope you will get a lot out of today's session. We have a panel group here that have a lots of knowledge between them. I am sure you will learn important stuff. 

Speaking of our panelists, I would like to introduce everybody for you. This is Colin Walker, the Assistant Commissioner, Agent Services, Support and Experience at Intermediaries and Lodgment, ATO. I think we are at the stage where I don't need to say anything except, "Here is Colin Walker." 

He has worked in the tax and finance industry for over 40 years. He has extensive experience in public administration and project management. Collin is currently responsible for managing the relationship between the ATO and tax practitioners and other intermediaries in the tax and super system. Welcome, Colin. 

Next to Colin we have Debra Anderson- accountant, online systems consultant and business owner of Anderson Tax consulting. Debra is a multi-award-winning small business specialist. She is a cloud systems consultant and author. She has over 20 years' experience working with businesses of all shapes, sizes, and industries. Debra sits on a variety of ATO advisory boards, including the Tax Practitioners Stewardship group, Single Touch Payroll for small business and the Professional Services Reference Group. 

You can see from everything she does that Debra is using this today to give her movie career a jumpstart. We hear that this is a popular segment amongst the community and we’re hoping to s see it expand further. 

Next to Debra we have Andrew Watson; once again one of our tried and tested faithfuls. I don't think you were here last time. 

ANDREW WATSON: I think you give me the last one off, Vlad. 

VLAD DUGANDZIC: Andrew is currently responsible for digital services and supporting the transition for tax professionals from lodging tax returns using the electronic lodgment system over to PLS, the Practitioner Lodging System. 

He is also working on transitioning the Tax and BAS agent portals to Online Services for

Agents. Which is going to be one of our key topics today and he will talk about how that is all progressing. Welcome, Andrew. 

ANDREW WATSON: Thanks. 

VLAD DUGANDZIC: And last but certainly not least is Mark Morris, business owner of Morris and Associates. Mark is a Professor of Tax Practice Principal lecturing in Taxation at La Trobe University’s business school. He runs his own consulting practice, Morris and Associates. Mark actually sits on a variety of ATO advisory boards, including the Tax Profession Digital Implementation Group, Future State Tax Profession Working Group, and the Tax Practitioner Stewardship Group. He was formerly the Senior Tax Counsel at CPA Australia. He is quite famous. 

MARK MORRIS: I have only been here 39 years, not 40. 

VLAD DUGANDZIC: We call him Professor now, of course, that he is the Professor X of the tax industry. Charles Xavier, eat your heart out. Thanks for coming along today. 

We are going to welcome questions as usual, so please use our live chat facility. We will try to get through as many as you can, but of course, because of the sheer number of questions we get, we cannot get through all of them. We will endeavor to answer them later. If you want, you can use #tpwebcast for those of you on Twitter. We will go for about an hour, and we will get stuck straight into it. 

I will give the first one to Andrew for a short update. But if you could give us an update on PLS and how it's been going through so far especially during tax time. 

ANDREW WATSON: Thanks. This is the first tax time when PLS has been the channel for lodging current year tax returns. There are still some minor processes going through ELS. But this tax time we have had successful lodgment of over 4.5million returns from agents through PLS. 

Overall, Agents have lodged 2% more returns this year, a small growth overall. 1.3 million through PLS from the same time last year. Our systems have performed really well. Processing speeds and availability has been good. We have seen that being pretty constant. 

The improvement that we are seeing is that clients of agents, more refunds are now being received by clients within five days than ever before from agents. It is tracking at about 78% of refunds being received within five days if an agent is lodging them. For people who self-prepare, it is 71%. That is significantly higher. On ELS we used to run at 74%. So we are seeing more returns being processed quicker. 

That is because PLS validates in real time. There are also more upfront checks to make sure the returns are more likely to go through. And we are seeing that flowing through the community, seeing refunds coming out more quickly. 

MARK MORRIS: 

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And the validation stops repeat workflow as well, doesn't it? 

ANDREW WATSON: Absolutely. It saves everyone time. Last year about a third of returns were processed through the PLS system at the start we saw that if there was something like a name or date of birth fixed it flowed through everyone's system smoother the next year. 

We are also finding more agents using pre-fill in PLS. Yesterday we had 26,000 successful pre-fills out of 47,000 returns lodged yesterday. We are seeing there are products made by 13 different digital service providers or software companies, and they have pre-fill available in our products. That is out of 17 different providers that have products available for lodging individual returns. 

So it is progressing during tax time that some of this functionality is being released. And at this time of the year, pre-fill information is pretty complete. We encourage you, if you have that functionality in your software, to explore how you can use that. 

The last thing on PLS, we still have minor forms and services that are still available in ELS, things like electronic fund transfer report. We left the available in ELS during this tax time. Activity statements can still be lodged through, and to some reports, through ELS. We are progressively switching those off through the rest of this (2018/19) calendar year. We are working closely with digital service providers. If there are any issues with these forms and services, we will work with them to make sure none of you are left without a working solution. 

We will continue, as we move through the rest of the year, to remove the last of those forms that are in ELS. So far this year it has been a really successful tax time across the board, and we have been pleased with the way our systems have shown up. It is safe to say that benefits of PLS for the ATO, and hopefully for agents as they become more familiar with it as well. Definitely for the 4 million individuals who have received their refunds quicker, it is a good outcome for everyone. 

VLAD DUGANDZIC: Thanks, Andrew. We encourage questions here, and it feels more authentic if you put your name to it. This is from Greg in South Australia. On the ATO website, there is talk of more real-time data. Does this include the capacity to include client data, as opposed to the current system, where it is often one week old? 

ANDREW WATSON: This is moving into the Online Services for agents which is the replacement for Tax Agent Portal. There are more account types that will be available in that environment. Particularly around superannuation and other taxes. We are going from 9 to 24 different types that are available. Previously, an agent would have to phone to get that information, but you will be able to see that on online services. 

Another thing is that we have had good feedback on it. Through online services, you have the ability to create a payment plan for a client. There are some parameters in there, for example the client cannot have defaulted upon two or more payment plans previously, up to two years, a maximum of $100,000. Is what we’ve got at the moment.

But what we are trying to do is, both from the point of view of agents, not needing to call to find

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a balance amount outstanding or needing to call to make payment plan,. You will be able to self-serve that. I know particularly our colleagues in superannuation are keen to this functionality to come out. So that for Things like the super guarantee amnesty (not yet law), and super guarantee- debts are available to be seen on the system. And likewise, payment plans can be created. There will be more visibility about what the balances are in that environment and more ability to create that stuff for agents themselves in the new environment. 

VLAD DUGANDZIC: That is brilliant. It is pleasing that it is running so smoothly. From a practical perspective, I will throw to Deb and Mark. Debra, In your experience, because you have been helping with the consultation and design. What are you finding in the improvements that is really benefiting you? 

DEBRA ANDERSON: In the PLS or the portal? 

(Laughter) 

ANDREW WATSON:I think you mean Online Services for Agents Deb

(Laughter) 

DEBRA ANDERSON:I am loving the PLS. One of my clients, I have been putting her return through to the last few years with the wrong date of birth. This year it told me I had the wrong date of birth, and it notified me of that mistake. It has helped me get my stuff in order as well. It also meant you guys didn't have to check it at your end, and the refund went straight through. And it is coming through really quick, which is fantastic. 

My favorite is that because it’s on PLS you can lodge it and see it straight away on the portal (Online Services for Agents). You can see whether or not it has been processed, and when a client rings you, because of course they do because they are expecting a refund today. They call you and ask where the refund is, and you can tell them whether or not it has been processed and let them know what date it will be paid. That processing transparency has been really good. And being able to set up payment plans. I love being able to set up payment plans. 

VLAD DUGANDZIC: As time goes on, do clients still expect to receive their tax returns on the same day? 

DEBRA ANDERSON: Of course they do. They give us the information this morning, and then they expect that we will have it done today. We are in a very immediate society, and talking about what will, in the future, I think that will be central. 

VLAD DUGANDZIC:What about you Mark, what has your experience been?

MARK MORRIS: Two things I love about PLS. I am rapt that when I lodge a return, I can see that it has gone through, I feel great and I know that I'm finished with that piece of work. And the fact that

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refunds come through more quickly than the former system is terrific. 

Another thing I think is really interesting is I was really involved in PLS and I know the sophistication and robustness of the system. I notice that and effort it took to get right. What is really interesting is that a lot of people say it is seamless, which is a big testament to the people involved in the ATO, digital service providers, and practitioners like Deb, who gave their time. It really is a success story. For a lot of people who are not closely involved, who just want to lodge returns, it is seamless. 

ANDREW WATSON: I hope that that is one of the key lessons we’ve learned from that and we’re looking to move from the portals to Online Services. Is to get the technology rights and that is a part of it but also as we transition the profession is ready as well. At the moment with online services, we have expanded it out to 600 Tax and BAS agents around the country. Across every state and territory, and a combination of city and country. 

We are working and we're pretty confident that the product that we have got is well and truly on the right track, but we will not commit to a definite release date. We will release that later this year, once we have some feedback that we’ll address from some of the people that we have spoken to, like Deb. 

DEBRA ANDERSON:When I sign off on it right?

ANDREW WATSON:Pretty much, that is one of our things when we go live. We want to make sure that we listen to feedback, because it has been a bit of a process. What we have identified, we have confirmation of what we have identified as our priorities are the right things. We need to make sure that they are working as intended, before we actually then release it to everyone. 

The other part, which we have mentioned before with this transition, we are not switching off the portals, or switching services online on one day, then the portal of the next day.

MARK MORRIS: Just like you did with the PLS. 

ANDREW WATSON: We know that it will not be perfect, but we want a feedback system. We will make the refinements before we then get to the point where people will work only in the new environment in the majority, not needing to shuffle back and forth between the portals. That will give us part of the confidence to then look at how we then move at a point to switch off the portals. 

VLAD DUGANDZIC: I want to go back to PLS, we have a question from Jill. This is directly for Andrew. How do we obtain activity statements for our clients through PLS? We could previously download from ELS in one go? 

ANDREW WATSON: Similar functionality is built in to PLS as I was saying before. That is why we’re not planning on switching those services off will be until later in December. As the software companies move

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ELS reports across into PLS versions. So a similar outcome. 

As with a lot of things in PLS, it is dependent on which software you use, and how that software is developed and what experience they want you to have. overall, we are looking at how ELS was like PLS was like for like, not losing functionality and we want to add some extra functionality along the way. 

I think you will find with your product, if it hasn't already moved across to PLS for activity statements, you will find that similar functionality to download a report, it will pre-fill some of the information on your statement. We have those steps already done each month or quarter as you go through the cycle. 

VLAD DUGANDZIC: It should be a good experience, Jill get into it. Another question for Andrew from Nicole. We understand that PLS Pre-fill was looking to be updated by the ATO to remove the words ‘pre-fill’ from the data, is this still happening?

DEBRA ANDERSON: I would say no, looking at your faces. I’m loving the Pre-fill- between the PLS coming into my software, it's saving me so much time.

MARK MORRIS:As a productivity measure it’s fantastic

VLAD DUGANDZIC:It’s an interesting questions because they’re talking about the words ‘Pre-fill’ from the data.

ANDREW WATSON: The data that we have had on the pre-fill report in the portal is for that to be available for the software developer to collect. Whether they are referring to it all as a pre-fill refer it or how they choose to refer it is up to their discretion. Our intention is that that will continue to come through. We would like to add small value we have availability and data. The question that we get every tax time is around whether we can get the data earlier, and we do work closely with the data providers to provide data as early as we can. It is a challenge, because... 

MARK MORRIS: Is it true that more companies report go on standard business reporting and exchange data in real time? And that will presumably increase over time in subsequent years?

ANDREW WATSON: We will always have some challenges with managed investment trusts, in that they do not, they cannot actually, on July 1, close off their books to do their distributions. We are finding that you will see incrementally with the banks and large share registries, that we compare it to where we were five years ago, or six years ago. We are getting the data closer to July 1. It's one of those anomalies, and we will work closely with them under the law. 

They are not required until later in the financial year to provide it to us, but in looking to provide a service as much for their customers as tax payers and agents, they work cooperatively with ours. 

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DEBRA ANDERSON: Is that legislated, when they need to give it to you? 

ANDREW WATSON: If it comes through their annual investment income report, which all started probably 20 years ago then yes. That is legislated. I think it would be in September or October, the legislative date. It has been where… As a quick aside, when I was dealing with that, from the bank's point of view, they want to give it to us as early as they can because it reduces phone calls for them from people chasing up. it If it is in pre-fill it easier.

DEBRA ANDERSON: Because I was thinking, that’s not very contemporary. 20 years ago, October would have been contemporary. These days, people are wanting everything now. I am surprised at just how I only deal with small businesses generally, and their owners, but I'm surprised at how many people are needing things earlier, because the bank is cracking down after the royal commission, for example. 

I am incredibly busy. I'm saying to people that I cannot have the returns by mid-August. I do not know if that is something that we should be trying to promote. 

ANDREW WATSON: It is a challenge for the banks, because we all rely very much on the data that they give us. They are interested in making sure that the data is right. They need to have time to run quality assurance, to make sure that it is right before they hand it over to us. We need to continue to work with them to get incremental improvements, but realistically, we will not be at a point where it's all there in July 1, it will be early August before we have the majority of the stuff in there. 

VLAD DUGANDZIC: You touched on online services, but I'm interested in your perspective as well, Deb. Being part of that beta testing as one of the 600, to get more from you. But is there anything that you wanted to add with regards to online services at this stage, Andrew? Before we throw to Deb?

ANDREW WATSON: We recently expanded from 200 to 600 agents. We have and I know from talking at a number of open forms, and engaging with agents, it's really good that there is some good word-of-mouth, and more people want to be part of it. At the moment we are keeping it where it is until we get our next round of improvements, which are due to be released later in September. We are confident as we come out of tax time, before the end of the year, we are confident that we are on track to be able to open it up to all Tax and BAS agents. 

Having been on a journey around PLS and some other technology, it's actually a good problem to have, that we have agents that want to be part of a new release. That is the one thing, I’d just ask people to be a little bit patient. I do think that we have plans for a webcast later this year, when we do make it available, we will dedicate significant time and hear a lot about it from us and also the professional associations that are keen to work with us. Because we do think there are good productivity benefits, for yourselves and benefits you can pass on to your clients from the new environment. 

VLAD DUGANDZIC: Professor, Are you part of the 600? 

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MARK MORRIS: No. I'm not. I have heard as a co-chair of the digital implementation group with Andrew what has been going on and I think it's fantastic. There will be a big payoff. We know that PLS is really 21st Century technology, and it's robust, and with the online services the ability to do quick searches and apply for payment plans, every time you log on, find out what your lodgment performance is is fantastic. 

ANDREW WATSON: Deb If you want to do a couple of things that you find good in there, Deb, but also if there are currently there, as we have had conversations, currently things that frustrate you. Hopefully we have them in the pipeline to address those. 

DEBRA ANDERSON: With the new portal, I know that I cannot get that word, Online services. Yesterday, I had to log into the old portal to have a look at an account statement, and it was so clunky, compared to the new sleek machine. Because I've been using it so much, I’d actually started taking it for granted. Going back into the old environment was really bizarre. It was the first time that I had really noticed it. 

But the great things as you mentioned before, the payment plan, I love the fact that you can go in and say, "How much do we want to do as a deposit, when do we want to start it? Do we want it to be weekly, fortnightly, monthly? How much I want to pay each time?" I can be sitting there on the phone with the client and solve the problem for them live. Then I can get the payment plan straight away and email it to them while I'm on the phone with them. It's all instantaneous. 

MARK MORRIS: But if you’ve got a large client base, the predictive name search would be fabulous wouldn’t it? Type three or four characters…

DEBRA ANDERSON: Once you type in the first three characters, it will bring up everything with those characters it would auto fill. Andrew, to his credit, when we first it would take about 15 seconds which feels like about three weeks when you just go to type in three letters, but now, it is instantaneous. So you know, the feedback that we have been able to give through the Beta program to Andrew’s team, we can actually say that even five seconds is too long to have to wait for something. 

They got onto it and have nailed it. 

ANDREW WATSON: For those that have not seen it, what we are trying to replicate is like when you go into a Google search, if you start typing a few letters, it starts to predict the rest of the word. This is with a client name. If you type 'Smi,' it will come up with John Smith, Mary Smith, Smith Family, the Smith family Trust, etc. There won’t be the need to remember all of their details or copy and paste things over. 

DEBRA ANDERSON: We used to have to type 'The Trustee', and all those little idiosyncrasies that are now no longer needed. 

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MARK MORRIS: Or we had to physically search for that. 

DEBRA ANDERSON: You can use it in various places within online services, so it’s just really easy and quick. Being able to see what your lodgment status is or your 85% thing has its good and bads. I was saying to Andrew that I fell below the 85% last period which was very stressful, I’m still in therapy. I'm loving the fact that it's a new financial year and its up at 100%. It would be nice if it was a different colour like pink or purple, but I will stick with blue. It is a very sleek machine. 

ANDREW WATSON: What are the things that are currently stopping you from signing off on us releasing it to the rest of your peers? 

DEBRA ANDERSON: To me, the deal-breaker at the moment is the accounts. Someone in their wisdom has put all of the debit and credit in one column, and you cannot print it, and when you do print it, it's weird. You guys are now, I think by the end of September, are now going to have the debit and credit in separate columns, and the ability to print them out and downloaded to Excel, which we can do with everything now. For me, the account list is my only reason to use the old portal. Once you have finished that, I would be happy to sign off. 

ANDREW WATSON: There are a couple of other things. Partly with the debits and credits thing, with the new environment it’ll work on mobile devices

DEBRA ANDERSON: No tax agent would do it on their mobile phone. 

ANDREW WATSON:So that’s where some of the design to make it mobile friendly, we heard from users that that was once of the key consistent pieces of feedback, so we dealt with that. 

MARK MORRIS:What about the ability to get prior year history data?

DEBRA ANDERSON: We can also look at people's previous year tax returns. We got a new client the other day and I was able to go in and look at their previous tax returns. 

MARK MORRIS: You should be able to look back to 2010 hypothetically. Multiple years, that's fantastic. 

DEBRA ANDERSON: We can see that into our software as well. Because PLS is a two-way thing. It is not just us giving information to the Tax Office. When it is built into practitioner software, we will be able to get it in there as well. 

ANDREW WATSON: 

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That's a good point. All of the functionality we are building into the Online Services for Agents environment, we are also eventually releasing as available to digital service providers to choose if they want to incorporate into their software. 

Last month we made available the API, which is the code that digital services providers can use to build functions. The code for payment plans was released. Making sure each month we are releasing more as we build them. It is building up a library of things that digital service providers can choose from. They will need some time and space, because they spent a lot of time working with us on the PLS for lodging returns to get it up and working, so we could all have a successful tax time in 2018. 

What we are doing is making those functions available, so you can start to see some of those things that you might have done previously in the portal, being able to do them easier in Online Services for Agents. But then, In the future, at a point, you will start to see them in your software. 

DEBRA ANDERSON: OK, great. 

VLAD DUGANDZIC: It's a good conversation. For everybody else, who is not part of the special 600 group, don't be afraid. You will be part of a public beta later in the year as Andrew did mention. We will continue to provide you with updates through the community, the newsletter, through webcasts like this. We will look at having webcasts dedicated specifically to Online services. 

We don't want to go further into it today, because we are halfway through and Colin has not even spoken yet. We might throw something to Colin if that’s okay? 

Just before I do though please, do use the live engagement section. Ask questions, and we like to see the banter, conversation and engagement between professionals in that section. You are answering each other's questions and getting engaged in conversations. There is a lot of value and benefits for agents in itself. 

Colin, onto the subject I know a lot of tax professionals will be interested in. It is around agent compliance. There has been a lot of focus in the press lately around agent compliance. Previously we talked about the black economy, we talked about a show devoted to parts of the individuals not in business tax gap. We have increased our focus on high-risk agents when it comes to work-related expenses. There is a lot of this going on. 

What we will do is to focus on ensuring a level playing field in the preventative work the ATO is looking at doing. Collin, I might ask you to give us an overview and the run-down of what is planned. 

COLIN WALKER: Thanks. From my perspective, the discussion we've just had has been very enervating and really good, from the perspective of where we are going in the future. At the same time, one of the things, as many of you that know me would know has concerned me for quite some time, is its very difficult out there in the profession and we have a situation where some agents are just not doing the right thing. 

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Some are reckless and some are trying to deliberately get around the system. Others are making simple mistakes due to the pressure of constant work, of clients coming in, too much on at the same time. 

That creates what we describe as a playing field that is not level. That means that some are competing in a world that is very difficult if you are doing the right thing all the time. Our focus and what we have talked about over the last few months over work related expenses and with the ‘agents of concern’. Is what I would call the worst group of agents a small group, who seek to cheat and do the wrong thing by their clients and by the tax system, who seek to go into things such as refund fraud. 

There is a big focus on dealing with those problems. But at the same time, we also do have a focus on looking at the agents who are trying to do the right thing. But at different stages, they make simple errors, like failing to remember to check things. They find that their clients tell them everything they need to know and that they have the right capabilities. 

So we have a project going that is going to see us do a lot of work with those agents who are trying to do the right thing, but are at times indicating they are having trouble, or they are indicating that they are making mistakes. The object of that is to help people to correct mistakes, to help change attitudes. 

It is very important as an agent, it is important to look at pre-fill data. Even if your software doesn't have pre-fill data today, it is available in the portal. Have a look, check it, and put it in there. 

You've recently heard about the work we have done around automatic amendments when tax returns are lodged. Those amendments are really simple amendments. They are picking up income that is in the pre-fill data, but hasn't appeared in a tax return. The vast majority of those are correct. The material should have been there. Why it has been missed, that's what we want to understand. 

So we are going to have around about 2,000 visits per year for the next four years. We will focus on agents that seem to be having a bit of strife. They are quite compliant under normal circumstances. We are going to develop ways and means to try and help them to work through, so they don't become agents who are egregious, they don't become agents who become reckless, and at the same time we can level the playing field. Capability will be a big thing in that space. 

Mark and I have had quite a few discussions, and we will talk further a little bit later.

VLAD DUGANDZIG:That is where we are going. Mark did you want to comment on that?

MARK MORRIS: It has been a really interesting process. I am keen to understand why that is happening. One of the great things about Colin's work is that you will get a better understanding about what are the drivers of this? I think more clients are increasingly discriminating in terms of fees. 

Is it a factor that you may not be able to get qualified staff, or you end up giving bad advice because you do not have the competence? It is also a factor relating to, with respect to

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government, the complexity of legislation. There’s some changes that have come out, and I know this is a boutique area. On small business conditions and I had to read it three times to understand it. I know someone who is a lovely person created at $2 million PI liability because he did not understand the concessions and shouldn’t have advised on it. 

I think capacity building will help raise the bar and level the playing field, but I think the findings of it may well be also it is also about looking at where the tax office and the professional associations needs to dedicate resources to help this. So we can try and void those outcomes.

DEBRA ANDERSON: With saying that, this is information that is available in the pre-fill data… 

MARK MORRIS: I think the pre-fill data is amazing. I do quality assurance reviews for CPA Australia and I would have thought in terms of a quality control system if you’re doing tax compliance. If you are not looking at a pre-filling report, I mean, really? 

DEBRA ANDERSON: I know, how can you do it? 

MARK MORRIS: It is a fantastic tool. Always rely on the pre-fill and then ask what has been omitted or needs to be substantiated. But it is a great starting point for a standard income tax return. 

DEBRA ANDERSON: It's the first thing I do. 

MARK MORRIS: If people don’t use it, I don't get it. 

DEBRA ANDERSON: If they are not using the tools provided to them, that's number one. It is efficiency as much as anything else. 

COLIN WALKER: I raised it because that is one of the things that we are seeing. I believe it is important. Another thing Mark raised is capability. We are all seeing situations where agents are struggling to deal with the complexity of legislation. 

We are seeing an amalgamation of smaller practices into bigger practices to get the economies of scale but also to get the capabilities. That is a concern to us. One of the things we will definitely be doing in the future is working with the board, working with professional associations, and very much with educational institutions to work out how to ensure we get agents who are capable and ready to do the jobs they want to do. 

MARK MORRIS: It is going to be much more complicated. It will require analysis and thinking, not just data entry and other items. It will be about understanding systems and interpreting legislation effectively. 

DEBRA ANDERSON: 

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Compliance is certainly not dead, is it? 

MARK MORRIS: No, it is changing. 

DEBRA ANDERSON: It's not going anywhere. 

VLAD DUGANDZIC: 2,000 is a large number. It is a valuable insight that will be gained with so many agents being visited. But Colin, from an agent's perspective, if they get a call from the taskforce or the people working in this area, should they be worried? 

COLIN WALKER: Not at all. You have to see it as a positive thing. There are opportunities here. We are just part of a bigger group. We work very closely with the profession. We work very closely with professional associations and have wonderful relationships. We want to continue to do that and expand out to the providers of the information. 

As well to not only really understand the difficulties, stresses and the strains that agents are going through, but to give them good advice as to how to deal with those issues. It's not about compliance; it's about helping people to get it right. From that perspective, I suppose even to the extent of being able to point out where the inadequacies are and help them ensure that as they go forward, they fix them. 

So it is a very positive thing, it's not about a big stick. 

VLAD DUGANDZIC: That's an important differentiation. If you are one of those 2000, be open and transparent with our guys, and everything that comes back can certainly help us build information that can be shared even more broadly, that will even skill our people more so. As we go out on these visits, it will only benefit everyone. 

COLIN WALKER: It is very much as Alison Langdon said at our last webcast, that we want to work together with the profession to deal with the tax gap and to make things better. It’s not about penalizing the profession, it’s about working with because the reality is, that is how the tax and super system works. We work together. 

VLAD DUGANDZIC: That is very positive. Deb, any final thoughts on what the ATO is trying to do here? 

DEBRA ANDERSON: I think prevention is always better than cure. One of the things that has been touched on here is that our complex legislation, and we cannot be expert in everything. We need to know what we don't know. We need to be utilizing out professional associations with their help desks and things like that for specific areas. We need to be making sure we are doing it right. 

The level playing field is very important and very close to my heart. I lost a few clients this year because I would not claim the dining table and chairs, the $4,000 couch, the $10,000 a month

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personal trainer for a 'staff training' and things like that. As far as the dodgy agents, this is not the 2,000 this is the other ones. This is that other group. I think it is really important for all practitioners that you crack down on that. 

MARK MORRIS: That talk gets out around the community; there is more expectation, and more rigor out there. And as soon as the tax agents who want to be more accurate are pointing out that people can go to the dodgy agents down the road and what they will and won't accept about that

DEBRA ANDERSON:There are so many good agents out there. All the agents that I know are really frustrated that there’s this handful that aren’t.

MARK MORRIS:Because they de-brand us, if they’re like that. You get a sense that because some of them are like that all of us are affected. 

VLAD DUGANDZIC: We have this large group that do these Open Forums where we have 200 or 300 agents in a room at the same time, and they are all saying the same thing. You’re seeing the frustration come out during these live events. 

I have a question for Colin from Joseph regarding validation when we’re talking about PLS. He is asking if MyTax uses online validation as well?’. 

COLIN WALKER: The answer has to come from a different perspective. MyTax is actually direct online product. The types of validation that you have in PLS are going on in the background all the time. For example, you cannot put an incorrect tax file number, you cannot put an incorrect name or date of birth. We will make you correct those things. I suppose the answer is yes, but in a different environment. 

VLAD DUGANDZIC: This one has come up a few times previously. But we might answer that again. Because it does not hurt to remind agents. It's a request from somebody without a name. It makes it difficult, particularly with the questions, why is the ATO directly contacting clients bypassing the tax agent? Why are they bypassing the tax agent. 

COLIN WALKER: It is not a common complaint, but the reality is that when an agent is involved, we will contact the agent first. There are occasions where that will not occur, such as when the agency is unavailable, where it is important that we need to get hold of the client. In the debt space in particular, it is not that unusual for it to be very difficult to get hold of the agent at the time. 

There is then a move that will say that we will contact them, the client. The basic general rule is the same as it always has been. We will work through the agent where it is possible to do so. There will be occasions where it will not work that way. 

As a normal rule, face to face, or verbally, it will be in that way. There are other things as well, such as SMS nudges, which may well go to the client in certain circumstances. They are about

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stimulating the client to a particular thing at a particular time. In most of those cases, we will advise the agents that we are doing that work in some way. 

ANDREW WATSON: The other side of that coin is, why do we keep contacting my when the person is no longer my client. It's some feedback on what we're looking to do in online services. We are looking at when you remove a client from a client list, and we will highlight and prompt as much as possible, whether they want to take their address and phone number out of the client field. Because that’s what’s on our record, the clients address and the client's phone number. 

DEBRA ANDERSON: It is on old portal as well. It prompts you to do that. It's when a new agent takes over, and kicks you off, they often do not take your details off. That is something I sent feedback on yesterday – that when a new agent comes on they can maybe have a view only or something like that so they don’t kick you off, when they have not yet taken on the client formally. 

Preferencing will also fix some of that problem. The new portal will have preferencing there, which we can choose if we want to be the people that are contacted, or whether we want the ATO to contact the client. 

ANDREW WATSON: We’re working on how to get that functionality available. It is probably along the lines of those SMS reminders. You need to be mindful of the current address and current contact details, where you do have it, as yours as the agent. You want it coming there. You are the address on behalf the client, whether its client details directly there. 

VLAD DUGANDZIC: I would like to spend a few minutes talking about the future. The question is what do you see the tax professional looking like in the future? 

MARK MORRIS: The very first thing that I talk about is to be aware of futurists. Nobody knows where things will go in the next 5, or 10, or 20 years. I think what’s interesting if you look at the ATO, and your commitment to technology and leveraging data, you look at the profession, which is responding in various ways across its various tiers. You look at the tertiary sector, which realises that data will be the heart and center of things. 

A few things come to my mind. The first is that in terms of university, we cannot teach tax in the same way that we have for the last 30 years. I think that data needs to be kind of the analysis of data, the use of data, it has to be integrated into the syllabus. 

People need to be literate and computer literate. I think because the skill set is going to be different, I'm not sure what will happen with compliance. I have a sense that there will be less of it. In the way that we are currently experiencing it. We need universities to advise young people to be adaptive and to have a whole range of skills when they hit the job market. It would be good to have some emphasis for them to be competent in MYOB, and there is at La Trobe. We have integrated data analytics. 

But also looking at soft skills like the ability to negotiate, the ability to work in teams; those skills that are fundamental. The other thing I think is that a lot of us are in the profession, the elder

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statesman category, right down to people in their 20s or 30s, there is going to have to be a need for those people to adapt as well. 

What I am tending to see is the smart firms, and I have a couple of seats up from me here in Deb, I think you are ahead of the curve. They’re always thinking if they should specialise in a particular discipline, or, as Colin indicated, to merge with another firm, some of us club together. 

If we're in a two-part firm, maybe one becomes a financial planner, and the other will be a tax guy. They cross refer. Or you might specialise in a particular field. One firm that I'm involved with B&R partners decided years ago that they would specialise in tax compliance services in deceased estates and testamentary trusts. They doing that really well, but they are now moving into complex advisory work in that area. 

What is interesting is that they’re taking staff along with them on their journey. You are getting people that are not only learning to use software efficiently and be good accountants, but can also write letters of advice and do research. That is where the value will be. I think there is a lot of... I had to say the major thing people need to be going forward, is adaptive and able to change. Be alert, but not alarmed. Be open to new ideas…

Seize opportunities as they arise. At our symposium on the future of the tax profession last year, Second Commissioner Andrew Mills was there. He was talking about future skills and he pointed out that when he started, which was a little bit after me, you did not have computers. You hand wrote letters, or you did not have a sophisticated IT that we have or the portal. We're all adapting, but that rate of change is going to accelerate. 

The challenge for everybody is to be adaptive. 

COLIN WALKER: It is interesting in an article today Robert Gottliebsen, it was talked about that there would be a new world that is coming out. That we are moving into a world where this generation is needing to focus on different skill sets, different work that we will do. Coming out of his talks are the types of things that we are seeing coming, things that will challenge us. As Mark said, it's about being alert, not alarmed. 

If we keep seeing and watching and hearing what is going on, and adapting to that change, we will continue to grow and develop. We will need new skills. We will need adaptive skills. I have no doubt that analytics and data, the ability to think of things that are really important. It is about the things that will slowly go away to some extent, being able to manipulate figures, but figures on pages, things like that. 

It's more like thinking about what you are seeing, the analytics. The challenge to me for the ATO going forward is how we work with agents, professional associations and institutions to ensure that we are equipping the agents of tomorrow with the right skills sets to be good agents of tomorrow. 

At the same time, we need to understand any gaps that are beginning to appear. So that, we can all work towards alerting people to the gaps that we see, so that the agents of today can skill up to those things. It’s a two pronged approach. We need to understand how to keep things moving, but we also need to understand that this profession is not dropping in numbers. It is

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growing. 

It continues to grow. We need to build that growth into the future. The same thing with what Mark was saying. I agree that you can listen to every futurist that you like, but at the end of the day, you will get as many views as to what that future will be. We are going through constant change. We have been doing it for as long as I have been alive. 

I think the changes are just faster at the moment. The challenges keeping one step ahead of it, and we will be fine. 

VLAD DUGANDZIC: Thanks Colin, coming to the end. Doesn't time fly when you're having fun? There are a couple of announcements that I need to make you aware of. I may have 30 seconds to throw to one of you. At the very end- we like to ask everybody what their take-home is. Perhaps one of you who has something really important that you want to finish off with. However, the next webcast will be on November 5, and we will have more livestreams planned for the rest of the year so stay tuned. Just on ATO Community- get on there and tell us about some of the topics you would like to hear. 

Also, Let us know who you want to get on the panel. Maybe we could call out to the Commissioner to see if he’d like to join us. Let us know what topics and who you would actually like to see on the panel. Just to let you know, and remind you about our ATO Podcast channel Tax inVoice. We have now released seven episodes on this channel, covering topics such as Single Touch Payroll, GST settlement, work-related expenses, talking tax time for small businesses, and for super. We’re releasing new episodes regularly and be sure to subscribe to our channel so that you do not miss out. 

You will find Tax inVoice on Apple iTunes, apple podcast, Stitcher (I’ve never heard of Stitcher), and Spotify. Or go to ato.gov.au/podcast. Make sure you get onto to those and be part of it. Would anybody like to give us some key words? 

DEBRA ANDERSON: Bold. Donkey Kong. Anything you have? 

MARK MORRIS: Talk to your peer group. I went to a discussion group, and everybody felt overwhelmed talking about the future and started talking amongst themselves. Think about where you will go now. Realise that change is coming. Sit down, work out what the best model is in the contemporary environment, and go for it. 

It is very much part of your community. Whether that is your peer group or your community, talk to them, and you'll get a lot out of them. 

COLIN WALKER: Discussion groups are really important, but at the same time, do not feel that you are on your own. The ATO is here to work together with you. We have been saying that for a long time. We will work with you. If you need help, we will help you. If you want to be part of developing that future, we will work with you, and the professional associations and the educational institutions. So do not feel that you are on your own. This profession is something we are part of as well. 

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VLAD DUGANDZIC: That brings us to the end, unfortunately. I know you are all going to be very sad about that. I would personally like to thank the panelists, Professor Mark Morris, thank you for coming along. Andrew Watson, our celebrity Debra Anderson, and Colin Walker. Thank you very much for your insight and thoughts, and the answering questions as we go. 

We want to keep the conversation going, so please go off to ATO community. We have launched a new tax professionals category as well. That will be available for you to engage with us and each other. We will publish a link to the recording pretty soon after this webcast. We've noticed a lot of people do go back to these webcasts after the initial live stream. There is a lot of repeat viewing. 

There will also be a survey based on today's web cast. Please take the time to fill that out. As with any sort of feedback. We will take the good with the bad, and try to improve the product for you. Apart from that thank you all for coming and go the wallabies they’ve reined me back in by winning against the Springboks and it’s been a hard road. Let’s hope that they do the same against the Pumas, Good afternoon and we’ll see you next time.

- END OF RECORDING-

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