ATO imposes $200m in super penalties

Mike Taylor

Managing Editor/Publisher, Financial Newswire

9 December 2025

With barely six months to go until the implementation of pay day superannuation, the Australian Taxation Office (ATO) has pointed to $200 million having been raised in penalties against employers who have failed to do the right thing.

The penalty figure was revealed by the ATO at the same time as it said it had returned $1.1 billion in unpaid superannuation to around one million superannuation accounts in 2024-25.

ATO deputy commissioner, Ben Kelly said the office had issued over 200,000 proactive reminders and prompts and had taken stronger action against employers who had failed to comply.

The ATO raised almost $800 million in Superannuation Guarantee Charge (SGC) liabilities, through:

• 120,000 reminders to employers
• More than 70,000 prompts to employers
• approximately 15,000 audit cases.

Kelly said in the past year, the ATO took more than 20,000 firmer actions against employers who failed to pay the SGC owing, this included issuing director penalty notices and garnishees and taking legal action where necessary.

“The ATO is committed to ensuring Australia’s workers receive their entitlements. Employers are required to pay superannuation for their eligible workers in full, on time and to the right fund,’ Kelly said.

“There are now better ways to detect and deal with non-compliance due to improved access to near real time Single Touch Payroll and superannuation fund data.”

“The introduction of Payday Super will allow the ATO to detect unpaid super earlier and take action to help a business get back on track and stay on track.

“For those businesses who don’t want to pay, the ATO will be able to take action faster to protect their employees’ super entitlements.”