Sound complicated? Get advice on the correct procedures for attracting staff to you organisation, good employment practices, employer obligations and terminating employment relationships. For information about employing staff and managing your employees, click here.

The new Fair Work Act means new provisions, including new National Employment Standards. The Fair Work website has a range of guides and templates to use when employing people, for keeping records and managing hiring and firing.

Contractor or Employee?

It is important to know the status of your workers for tax purposes as you have different obligations depending on whether a worker is an employee or a contractor. Employees are those workers you employ in your business. You generally have to withhold an amount from payments you make to them and send the withheld amount to the Tax Office.

Contractors are those workers who are self-employed and have a contract with you to provide services. The information in the table on the next page will help you determine if your workers are contractors.  Just because a worker quotes an ABN doesn’t mean that they’re a contractor. Whether a worker is an employee or a contractor depends on all the facts and circumstances of how you engage them and how the work is performed. It is very important to determine of your workers are employees or contract workers for tax purposes.