BAS & Tax Code questions

No GST applies to these types of fees within Australia as they are applied to motor vehicle registration transactions.  The correct Tax Code is GFR, meaning that the particular product or services has been legislated as not attracting GST, rather than it simply not applying because it is not a “good or service” according to the Act.  That means the item will appear on the BAS under GST Free Sales.

The Item Code setup can be used to change the Tax Code for registration and stamp duty charges when they are purchased, but any fees entered into the Registration, Rego/Tfr or Stamp Duty fields on the Sale tab of the stock card will always show GFR and this cannot be changed.

To determine what transactions they are, use the Detailed BAS report for that section, locate and change the tax code(s) for the transaction.  It may be necessary to adjust the default tax code for that account also to prevent future recurrences.

Firstly check whether the "activity" within the associated General Ledger control account matches the total shown on the BAS.  To do this open an Account Inquiry window and select the appropriate account and the same date range as the BAS.  For GST Payable, view the Total Credits for the period shown in the Summary section.  This should match total shown on the BAS Report.  If it does, then the problem lies with a previous period.  If the opening balance of the account for the quarter is not zero, then check that the previous period's BAS liability was correctly cleared out of the account.  If this is not the problem, then it is possible that a transaction was entered after the last BAS was produced, but was dated within that last BAS period.  In that case, you must manually adjust your submitted BAS this period to include that transaction.  If the total activity for this period does not equal the amount shown on the BAS report then it possible the BAS Tax Codes have not been correctly configured.  Each Tax Code must be "matched" to the correct section of the BAS report in order to appear on the BAS report.  Check that each Tax code is correctly matched in the BAS Tax Codes setup window.

Cash accounting means that the expense or income, and the GST transaction, is not recognised until the money changes hands.  So if you sell a vehicle and get paid a week later, the GST is not recognised until a week later, not when the sale was created.  Accrual accounting means that the income/expense and GST transaction is recognised immediately the invoice is raised, regardless of whether you have paid/been paid for it.

Dealerlogic is a package especially designed for Australian motor dealers.  In most cases Accrual accounting suits motor dealers better than Cash accounting, because sales (vehicles) are generally paid for at the point of delivery, whereas they often get terms on purchases.  That means they can obtain Input Tax Credits before having paid for the item, and they generally won't have a GST Payable liability before they have been paid for the sale.  Additionally businesses that turnover more than $20M annually MUST account for GST using the Accrual system, and due to the large "ticket" price of motor vehicles in comparison to say paper clips, even a small to medium sized business can find themselves over that threshold.  It is impractical for a niche software package to attempt to support two accounting methods, so the most favourable method is used.