Taxable Payments Annual Report (TPAR) Guide for 2026

The Taxable Payments Annual Report (TPAR) is a yearly report Australian businesses in certain industries lodge with the ATO, listing each contractor they paid for specific services, the contractor's ABN, name and address, and the total paid including GST. It covers 1 July to 30 June and is due by 28 August. The ATO uses the data to check that contractors declare all their income, which is why both payers and contractors should care about it.

This guide explains which businesses must lodge, what to include and exclude, how to prepare it from your records, penalties, and what TPAR means for you if you are the contractor being reported. It is general information, not tax advice; your tax or BAS agent can confirm how it applies to you.

Who must lodge a TPAR?

The taxable payments reporting system covers businesses that pay contractors for these services:

Industry	Who lodges	Examples of reportable payments
Building and construction	Businesses primarily in building and construction that pay contractors for building and construction services	Subcontracted carpentry, plumbing, electrical, painting, tiling
Cleaning services	Businesses providing cleaning services, including where those services are 10% or more of GST turnover	Subcontracted office or end-of-lease cleaning
Courier and road freight	Same 10% rule	Owner-driver delivery runs
Information technology	Same 10% rule	Contract developers, network support, software installation
Security, investigation or surveillance	Same 10% rule	Contract guards, crowd control, alarm monitoring
Government entities	Federal, state and local government bodies	Payments for supplies of services

The 10% rule matters for mixed businesses. A marketing agency that also runs IT support, for example, may need to lodge if IT services make up 10% or more of its GST turnover and it pays contractors to deliver them. The ATO's TPAR reminder for small businesses sets out the industries and deadline.

What to include on the TPAR

For each contractor, report:

• ABN (if known),
• name and address,
• gross amount paid for the year, including GST,
• total GST included in those payments, and
• any tax withheld where no ABN was quoted.

The report is based on payments made between 1 July and 30 June, not on invoices received. An invoice dated 20 June and paid 5 July falls into the next year's report.

What not to include

• Payments for materials only. If an invoice combines labour and materials, report the whole amount.
• Wages paid to employees, which are reported through Single Touch Payroll.
• Payments for services outside the reportable categories.
• Incidental payments that are not for the reportable service, such as buying equipment.

If a contractor does not quote an ABN, you generally must withhold tax at the top rate (47%) from their payments under the "no ABN" withholding rules, which have their own reporting.

How to prepare and lodge your TPAR: step by step

1. Collect contractor details at onboarding: ABN, legal name, address and GST status. Check the ABN on the ABN Lookup.
2. Code contractor payments in your accounting software to a "TPAR contractor" category or tag through the year.
3. After 30 June, run the contractor report for 1 July to 30 June on a cash (payments) basis.
4. Review each line: remove materials-only payments and non-reportable services, and check totals against invoices.
5. Lodge electronically through online services for business, your business software, or your tax or BAS agent. Paper lodgments are no longer accepted.
6. Lodge by 28 August. If the date falls on a weekend, lodging on the next business day is generally accepted.
7. Keep the records behind the report, including contractor invoices.

Worked example: a small building business

Coastline Renovations Pty Ltd in Newcastle paid three subcontractors in 2025-26. These figures are illustrative.

Contractor	Invoices paid	Included	Gross reported (incl. GST)	GST
Sam Nguyen Electrical	9 invoices, labour and parts	All	$48,180	$4,380
BlueLine Plumbing Pty Ltd	6 invoices	All	$31,350	$2,850
Hardwood Supplies	4 invoices, timber only	None (materials only)	$0	$0
Mia Ford Painting (not GST-registered)	3 invoices	All	$12,600	$0

Coastline reports three contractors with gross payments of $92,130 and GST of $7,230. Hardwood Supplies is left off because every invoice was for materials. An invoice from BlueLine dated 25 June 2026 but paid on 3 July 2026 belongs in the 2026-27 report, due 28 August 2027.

If you are the contractor: why TPAR matters to you

If you are a subcontractor, cleaner, courier, IT contractor or security contractor, your clients may be reporting what they paid you. The ATO matches that data against the income in your tax return and BAS. Differences usually come from:

• Timing: you report income on an accruals basis or by invoice date while the client reports by payment date.
• GST: the TPAR shows amounts including GST, while your income tax return uses GST-exclusive income.
• Materials: mixed labour-and-materials invoices are reported in full.
• Missing income: cash jobs left out of the return, which the ATO is specifically looking for.

The best defence is clean invoicing: your ABN, a clear GST line, separate lines for labour and materials, and a unique invoice number. Our construction subcontractor invoice template and cleaning service invoice template show the layout. The Australian tax invoice requirements list the mandatory fields for GST-registered suppliers.

Industry-specific points to watch

Building and construction

Building and construction services cover a broad range of work on buildings and structures, including alterations, repairs, installation, demolition, design and project management, landscaping and site preparation. Payments for private and domestic projects, such as building your own home, are not reportable. If you are a head contractor, check every subcontractor category, not just the obvious trades.

Cleaning

Cleaning covers interior and exterior cleaning of buildings, vehicles, windows, carpets and similar. A facilities business that subcontracts cleaning to sole traders must track those payments separately from its own staff costs.

Courier and road freight

Owner-drivers, last-mile delivery contractors and freight subcontractors are the typical reportable payees. Fuel or toll reimbursements included on their invoices are part of the gross amount paid.

Information technology

IT services include software development and installation, hardware installation and repair, network services, data storage and processing, and IT support and consulting. Software licences purchased off the shelf are goods, not reportable contractor services.

Security, investigation or surveillance

This includes contract guards, crowd controllers, alarm monitoring, private investigators and surveillance services. Agencies that provide security staff on contract are a common source of missed reports.

Setting up your records so TPAR takes an hour

Record	When to capture it	Why it matters
Contractor ABN, name, address	Before the first payment	Required fields on the report
Contractor GST registration status	Before the first payment, then yearly	Determines the GST column
Payment date for each invoice	When you pay	Report is on a payments basis
Labour vs materials split	When you approve the invoice	Materials-only invoices are excluded
Service category	When you code the bill	Only reportable services are included

Penalties and late lodgment

The ATO can apply a failure-to-lodge penalty of one penalty unit per 28 days or part of 28 days late, up to a maximum of five units for small businesses, with higher multiples for medium and large entities. Penalty unit values are indexed each year. In practice, the ATO sends reminders first, and lodging promptly once you realise is always better than waiting. If you were required to lodge before but have nothing to report this year, lodge a non-lodgment advice instead of ignoring the reminder.

What to do if you find an error after lodging

Mistakes happen, especially in the first year of reporting. If you discover that a contractor was left off, an amount was wrong, or a payment that should not have been reported was included, lodge an amended TPAR through the same channel you used for the original rather than waiting for the next year. Correct the specific contractor lines, keep a note of what changed and why, and tell the contractor if the change affects the figure the ATO holds for them. Contractors who believe a client has reported them incorrectly should ask the client to amend; meanwhile, report your own correct income and keep the invoices and bank records that support it. Data-matching letters from the ATO usually ask you to explain a difference, and an invoice-by-invoice reconciliation is the quickest answer.

Common TPAR mistakes

• Reporting invoices instead of payments for the year.
• Excluding GST from the gross figure, which should include it.
• Missing contractor ABNs or addresses, which makes data matching fail and can draw ATO queries.
• Leaving off payments to companies. Payments to incorporated contractors are reportable too.
• Not checking the 10% rule when a side service line grows.
• Treating employees as contractors. If a worker is really an employee, they belong in payroll, with super; see Payday Super 2026.

Contractors who are being reported should also make sure their own tax payments keep pace; see our guide to PAYG instalments. If you are setting up as a contractor, start with how to get an ABN.

Clear invoices make TPAR simple for both sides. Create invoices showing your ABN, GST and separate labour and materials lines with our free invoice generator, with no sign-up and instant PDF download.