Important notice: Information provided by Deputy is intended for general guidance purposes only and is not a substitute for professional legal or financial advice. Deputy does not accept liability for actions taken based on this information. Employers are responsible for ensuring their employees are paid correctly in line with the applicable award/s, industrial instrument/s and relevant employment agreements. For specific issues or if you are unsure about your employee/s’ entitlements, please consult a legal, financial or employment relations specialist. Deputy does not offer advice on employment law or taxation matters, including payroll specifics.

 

Once you have completed a pay run, you can report the pay run information to the ATO via Single Touch Payroll (STP). You will need to manage when you submit the information to the ATO to meet your STP reporting obligations.

• Set your Software ID in the ATO manager before your first submission
• Submitting the pay run to the ATO via STP for every pay run
  • Prepare to lodge STP
  • Review your STP data
  • Sign the ATO Agreement
• Status of the STP submission
• STP reporting tips

 

Set your Software ID in the ATO Access Manager portal before your first submission

The very first time you complete and lock a pay run in Deputy Payroll, you will be automatically directed to the Submit to ATO section of Complete Pay run and will need to set up the Software ID.

You will need to use the information on this page in your own ATO account to set up your Software ID with the ATO so that you can lodge your first STP submission.

 

1. Click Copy to copy the Software Provider: Microkeeper - Deputy's STP engine, and click Copy to copy the Software ID number.

Note:

• The software provider will always be Microkeeper - this is accurate and correct as this is Deputy's STP engine
• Do NOT copy the Software ID example in the screenshot below, use the Software ID number that appears in your own account on this page. 

2. Go to the ATO Access Manager at https://am.ato.gov.au/ and log in to your account.

Trouble logging in to the ATO Access Manager?

• Your accountant might be able to complete these steps on your behalf
• Call the ATO on 1300 852 232

3. Select your ABN

4. Go to My hosted SBR software services and click Notify the ATO of your hosted service.

5. Search for Software Provided.

6. Paste your Software ID number as copied above, click Next, then Save.

 

Once you have completed those steps successfully, click Done on the Software ID Setup page in Deputy.

 

You will only need to carry out the above steps the first time you complete a pay run and lodge an STP submission to the ATO.

 

Submitting the pay run to the ATO via STP for every pay run

Once your software ID is set up with the ATO you are ready to lodge your STP submission for your pay run.

 

Prepare to lodge STP

When submitting a pay run to the ATO, you'll prepare to lodge STP by selecting from the following options:

STP Submission Types

Select from:

• Normal pay run or 
• Final pay run (used for the final pay run or finalisation of the financial year)

Note: if you select Final Payrun, all staff for the entire financial year will be selected and included in the Final STP submission. It is considered best practice to follow some sort of finalisation process prior to submitting an STP finalisation i.e. reconcile your payroll with your accounting etc. 

Under Advanced option you can also select from:

• Zero Pay run - All Staff - this will include all staff with a zero for all fields as a Final STP submission - This can be used for example changing ABNs mid-year.
• Zero Payrun - Payrun only - this will only include the staff in this specific payrun as zero.

•  

What event is being lodged

Indicate whether the STP submission you are making is:

• Submit event (Includes both company and employee data)
• Update event (Includes employee data only)

Note Lodging a Submit event is your normal STP submission an you are only allowed one per Payrun. The submission must be on or before the payment date

Lodging an Update is for when a submission needs to be to updated or corrected and can be made after the payment date. For example when you want to send an amendment for a previous financial year. 

 

Review your STP data

Once you have made your STP submission type selections and indicated what type of event is being lodged, click Review Data.

If there are any problems with your data, they will be listed in a warning pop up, similar to the example shown below.

Click on the team member's names to open their employee profile in another tab (you won't lose your place in payroll) and resolve the errors by completing the missing information.

Once you have entered all the missing information, go back to the Single Touch Payroll ATO Lodgement tab you were working in before clicking on team members names and click Review Data again.

If you have corrected all errors in the data you will see a Data passed validation message.

You are ready to review your data:

• Click Show Business Data to see the information about your business you are about to lodge.
• Review your employee STP data, scrolling right to see all columns
• The sum of the PAYG tax included in this pay run is displayed at the bottom of the table.

Alternatively, you can download a CSV file of this data to review in spreadsheet software by clicking CSV export.

A CSV file will download to your computer and you can open it in spreadsheet software to review the STP data.

Once you are happy with the data, click I have reviewed data.

 

Sign the ATO Declaration

The ATO requires a declaration indicating the information contained within the payroll report is true and correct. This declaration must be made by the sender (declarer). It is your responsibility to validate that the information is true and correct. 

When you click on the icon "I have reviewed the data" you will need to read the statement on the screen, and if you agree, tick the box provided and click Lodge STP. It will then become a declaration signed by you and sent to the ATO with the STP report.

 

This is the declaration you will be making:

I acknowledge that Microkeeper Pty Ltd, is not providing an agent service and is not responsible for the preparation of any taxation, superannuation or other related documents on behalf of this business/entity.

Microkeeper can however, submit transmissions through the SBR channel that this business/entity chooses to make.

I "Your name", declare the information transmitted in this payroll report is true and correct and I am authorised to make this declaration for ["the entity on whose behalf your are making the submission"].

Tick this box to sign this declaration with your unique Microkeeper username "your username" and the machine credentials provided by Microkeeper.

You will receive a success message when the STP is lodged.

Note: This submission could take up to 72 hours to appear in your ATO Business Portal.

 

Status of the STP submission

How do I know the status of the STP submission? One place to start is the Processed Pay run tab. The status of each pay run gives us an idea of what is happening with the STP submission.

 

Processed Pay runs

There are several states the pay run can be in on the Processed pay run tab:

• Processing - Pay run is in draft and has been processed but not yet completed. The pay run is not yet locked and STP has not been lodged yet.
• STP Pending - Pay run has been processed and completed. The pay run is locked, but STP has not been lodged with ATO.
• STP Processing - Pay run has been processed and completed. The pay run is locked and STP has been lodged with ATO but ATO has not responded yet (STP submission can take up to 72 hours)
• STP failed - Pay run has been processed and completed. The pay run is locked and STP has been lodged with ATO but the submission failed.  
• STP complete - (not in screen shot) Pay run has been processed and completed. The pay run is locked, and STP has been lodged successfully with ATO

 

STP Log

The STP log on the Submit to ATO page will also give us more information on what is happening with the STP submission.

Checking the STP Log will inform you of when the STP submission was made and the state of the STP submission along with any errors.

• Submitting 

• Unreachable

 

STP reporting tips

• You must submit each pay run to the ATO
• Year To Date values are submitted with every pay run
• Tax File Number Declaration (TFND) is included with STP data
• All Payroll rules must have the correct STP classification selected
• Only staff included in the pay run are reported on, except where the team member has an ongoing child support deduction or for the Final pay run
• Check when you have to make an End Of Financial Year final STP submission by. Generally this must be made before the 14th of July each year.
• Once successfully submitted, a summary can be viewed in the ATO Business Portal > Employees > STP Reporting