GST, the ABN and tax for independent NDIS support workers

Not unless you're registered for GST, or required to be. If you aren't, say so on your invoice (“No GST charged: not registered for GST”) and never add 10%.

If you are registered, the ATO says a support to a participant is GST-free when all four of these are met:

1. the participant has an NDIS plan in effect;
2. the support is a reasonable and necessary support in the plan's statement of supports;
3. there's a written agreement between you and the participant, or someone else such as their plan manager, a guardian or a relative;
4. the support is one the NDIS GST-free determination covers. The ATO's page lists them.

The written agreement has to name the participant and say the support is one of the reasonable and necessary supports in their plan. It can be one document or several, such as letters, receipts and invoices, and it can be electronic. A support beyond what the plan specifies, more hours than it allows for example, isn't GST-free.

A service agreement that covers it, free to copy: NDIS service agreement template. What to write on the invoice: how to invoice the NDIS.

You have to register once your GST turnover reaches $75,000. That's your total business income from all your businesses, not your profit, less a short list the ATO gives: the GST in your prices, sales not connected with your business or with Australia, input-taxed sales, and some sales to associates. GST-free sales aren't on that list, so your GST-free NDIS income counts towards the $75,000.

The ATO looks both ways. You've reached the threshold if:

• this month and the previous 11 months come to $75,000 or more, or
• this month and the next 11 months are likely to.

Once you have to register, you have 21 days to do it. If you don't, the ATO says you may have to pay GST on sales made since the date you were required to register, even if you didn't include GST in the price.

You can also register before you reach $75,000. Then you can claim back the GST in the price of what you buy for your business, even when everything you sell is GST-free, but you generally have to stay registered for at least 12 months. Whether that's worth it for you is a question for a registered tax agent.

If you run your own support work business, you're entitled to an ABN. Work you do as an employee doesn't count, even if someone calls it contracting.

It's free. Apply on the Australian Business Register's website; a tax agent may charge if they do it for you.

Put it on every invoice. If a business pays you without your ABN quoted, it must hold back 47% of the invoice and send it to the ATO, unless the payment is $75 or less before GST.

Participants and plan managers generally don't take tax out of what they pay you. You pay it through your tax return, and through instalments once the ATO puts you on them. Your business income goes on your own individual return, in its business section; there's no separate return for a sole trader.

On top of that is the Medicare levy, 2% of your taxable income, or less on a low income.

Putting it aside

The ATO doesn't publish a share to set aside. What it does say is that setting up another bank account for your tax, separate from your business account, could help.

It puts you on PAYG instalments, payments through the year towards your tax, once your latest return shows business and investment income of $4,000 or more, your latest assessment shows tax of $1,000 or more, and your estimated tax is $500 or more. If you're new to business and expect to pass those, the ATO suggests joining voluntarily.

Lodging and records

If you lodge your own return, it's due by 31 October, or the next business day when that falls on a weekend. A registered tax agent can generally lodge later, if you're with them before 31 October. Keep most business records for 5 years.

As a sole trader you claim your business expenses on your return. Two rules come first. The ATO says you can't claim anything the NDIS paid for, even if you use it to earn your income. And where something is partly personal, like your phone, you claim only the business share.

Your car

The simple way is the cents per kilometre method: 91 cents a kilometre in 2026-27, for up to 5,000 business kilometres per car a year. The rate covers all your running costs, fuel, registration, servicing, insurance and depreciation included, so you add nothing on top. You don't need receipts, but the ATO may ask how you worked out your kilometres, so keep a diary or a log.

Over 5,000 kilometres, you use the logbook method for all of it: a logbook kept for at least 12 weeks in a row that shows your usual travel, then the business share of your actual car costs. A logbook lasts five years.

Which trips count is the hard part. For a business, the ATO treats driving between home and your place of business as private, unless you run a home-based business, meaning an area of your home set aside and used only for the business. A home-based business can claim the trip to a client's place. The ATO's guide for support workers, written for employees, lets a worker with no fixed workplace claim the trips from home to clients and between clients. Its pages for businesses don't say the same for a sole trader with no business area at home. If that's you, ask a registered tax agent which applies.

The kilometre rate in a participant's agreement is something else: income you bill, not a deduction. More in claiming NDIS travel.

Your phone and clothes

The ATO's guide for community support workers covers these. It's written for employees, but the ATO's NDIS page points contracted support workers to it too. Your phone, data and internet: the work share. Clothes: ordinary clothes and shoes aren't deductible, even if you only wear them to work; protective clothing, such as non-slip shoes, is.

Equipment

Small businesses can write off the full cost of an eligible asset under $20,000 in the year it's first used. The ATO says that limit is law from 1 July 2026.

The $1,000 instant tax deduction

It's law, from the 2026-27 tax return: up to $1,000 for work expenses, without receipts. But it's for wages and similar income. The ATO says it won't apply if you only earn business income, and you claim business expenses as usual. If you also have a job, it can apply to that.

Most of what a support worker earns is personal services income: income mainly from your own skills or effort. If 80% or more of it comes from one client and their associates, you fail the ATO's 80% rule, and unless you pass its results test, the personal services income rules apply. The ATO says that if you're paid by the hour, passing the results test is unlikely.

When the rules apply, you're treated much like an employee for deductions. You can't claim rent, mortgage interest, rates or land tax for your home, for example.

As a sole trader you don't have to pay super for yourself. You can choose to put money in, and claim a deduction for it, if you give your fund a notice of intent and get its acknowledgment before you claim. Deductible contributions count towards the concessional cap, $32,500 a year from 1 July 2026.

Whether someone has to pay super to you is a separate question. The ATO says independent contractors paid mainly for their labour are eligible for super guarantee even if they quote an ABN, and that a participant who self-manages their plan and uses it to hire a carer may have to pay it. It's the payer's obligation, and the ATO's Work out if you have to pay super page walks through it.

George keeps the tax side next to the work:

• a running estimate of your income tax and Medicare levy for the year, with the working shown, from the ATO's rates;
• a watch on your last 12 months of invoicing against the $75,000 GST threshold;
• receipts George reads for you when you snap them: the shop, the date, the total and any GST;
• a logbook for your drives;
• one file for your accountant, in the format Xero, MYOB or QuickBooks imports;
• service agreements with the GST-free wording the ATO's conditions ask for.

It shows you the ATO's figures beside your own. What to do with them is a question for a registered tax agent.