Superannuation – Personal contributions (after tax)

Topping up your super is easy.

Topping up your superannuation ensures you have as much as possible when you retire. One of the ways to do this is by making personal contributions.

An 'after tax' contribution, also referred to as Personal, Voluntary or Member contribution, is money deposited into your super account by you, after your income tax has been deducted and no tax deduction has been claimed.

These contributions do not attract contribution tax of 15% and are recorded in your super account as 'tax-free' contributions. However, any earnings on these contributions in your super account are subject to tax of up to 15%.

When you draw these funds out of superannuation prior to age 60 either in a lump sum or as income, no tax is charged on this portion of your superannuation account.

If you earn less than $46,920* and make personal contributions, you may be eligible for the government co-contribution.

Superannuation – Spouse (after tax) contributions

You can make contributions to superannuation on behalf of your spouse. The conditions for making a spouse contribution are:

• Your spouse is under age 65 or if they are over age 65, they must meet a work test
• You can be any age
• You are both Australian residents and Australian taxpayers

Contribution caps on after tax contributions

For personal and spouse contributions, anyone can currently contribute up to $150,000 per year into superannuation.

If you are over age 65, you must be able to meet a work test to be eligible to contribute to super. This means you can only contribute to super if you work more than 40 hours over 30 consecutive days in that financial year.

If you’re under the age of 65, you can bring forward up to two years of personal/spouse contributions, which means you can make up to $450,000 of super contributions in one year. If you do this, then you are not allowed to make any further personal/spouse contributions for the next two financial years.

The ‘bring forward’ rule does not apply to anyone over the age of 65. If you exceed the cap, your excess contributions are subject to a penalty tax which is the highest marginal tax rate of 46.5% (including the Medicare level).

Let’s look at some examples

• If you make a $450,000 after tax contribution to your super during 2011/12, you are bringing forward two years of contributions and cannot make another after tax contribution until at least July 2014, being the 2014/15 financial year.
  
  
• If you make a $151,000 after tax contribution to your super during 2011/12, you have triggered the ‘bring forward’ rule for the next two years. That means you can only make another $299,000 of after tax contributions during the years ending 30 June 2013 and 30 June 2014.

How do I make after-tax contributions?

There are four easy ways for you to top up your super with after tax contributions. But please note, we must have your Tax File Number recorded to accept after tax contributions.

1. BPAY^® - No forms to fill out – just transfer your contribution directly into your super account using phone or internet banking. All you need are the following details:
   
   
   • Catholic Super Biller code
   • Your unique BPAY Reference number
     if you have registered for Member Online , you can find our Biller code and your unique BPAY Reference number online. If you don't have a Member Online account, you can register online for one right now! You just need your member number handy! Or call us on 1300 655 002 to get your BPAY details. 
     
     
2. Send us a cheque - Make your contribution by sending us a cheque. Please include your name, membership number and address so we can correctly identify you when processing the cheque or download the form to send with the cheque.
   
   
3. Ask your employer to deduct contributions from your pay - Your employer can send us the money at the same time they send their Superannuation Guarantee (SG) and salary sacrifice contributions to Catholic Super for you. They just have to make sure they tell us it is an after tax contribution. Ask your employer about this option.
   
   
4. Arrange for a direct debit from your bank account – Take the hassle out of contributing and set up a regular direct debit from your nominated bank account. You can stop this at anytime if your circumstances change. Download the form to set this up

 

Read more on Super Co-contributions

Want to know more about after tax contributions? Contact Us or call 1300 655 002 (Mon-Fri 8.00am-5.30pm AEST).

* The Government announced further reductions to the co-contributions scheme, for personal contributions made from 1 July 2012 for the 2012/2013 financial year. The information contained on this page reflects the proposed changes, but they are not law as they have not been passed by parliament or received royal assent.

^®Registered to Bpay Pty Ltd
ABN 69 079 137 518