According to the Taxation Institute of Australia, this refers to around 200,000 cases, and are debts that the ATO would not have normally actioned.

The ATO will continue to action a further 1.5 million cases, and has reinforced that all the information is quarantined and differentiated from the contentious scheme implemented by the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) in the United States.

In addition, the ATO has also made it clear that once a debt is referred for private collection all correspondence in respect of the debt should be with that debt collection agent, and is also considering expanding the debt collectors’ powers by authorising them to exercise the Commissioner’s powers to remit penalties.

This move is aimed at stopping perceived reverse workloads, as currently such cases are referred back to the ATO for remission.

Finally, the ATO has advised that it has commenced a project aimed at matching distributions in partnership and trust returns with the amount reflected in the individual’s tax returns as there is evidence of wide spread omission.

However, the inherent problem with this approach, according to the Institute, is that mismatches will occur where there has been full disclosure, arising when distributions have been netted off or expenses claimed by the individual against the distribution.