Gaining Relevant Experience

Overview

If you are applying with the Tax Practitioners Board (TPB) to register or renew your registration as an individual BAS agent, you need to have a minimum number of hours of relevant experience as follows:

• For voting members of a recognised BAS or tax agent association, such as Australian Bookkeepers Association, the requirement is 1,000 hours in the past four years;
  In all other cases, the requirement is 1,400 hours in the past four years. 

Relevant experience can include work:

• as a registered tax or BAS agent;
• under the supervision and control of a registered tax or BAS agent; or
• of another kind approved by the TPB, such as an academic teacher in relevant taxation laws.

The Relevant Experience must include substantial involvement in one or more BAS services. Most work in preparing the books and records of a business for the purposes of that business completing their BAS obligations, including their pay as you go (PAYG) withholding and instalment obligations, will be considered to be relevant experience for the purposes of registration as a BAS agent. However, work in preparing a return for a state tax obligation, such as payroll tax, is not considered relevant experience.

Click here to access the TPB’s web site for examples of the types of services that constitute a BAS service.

Demonstrating Relevant Experience

The manner in which you are required to demonstrate relevant experience to the TPB will depend on whether you are making a new application for registration or simply renewing an existing registration.

If you are making a new application for registration as an individual BAS agent, you will need to attach a completed Statement of relevant experience for BAS agent (SRE) form to your application. The information contained in the SRE form should provide evidence of your substantial involvement in one or more types of BAS services.

If you are renewing your registration as an individual BAS agent, questions about your relevant experience are covered in the online renewal application. You are able to self-complete these questions as a registered BAS agent. You do not have to attach a separate statement of relevant experience.

How can ABN BAS Assist in Demonstrating Relevant Experience?

ABN BAS holds BAS Agent number 91970004 and is listed on Tax Practitioner Board’s Online Tax and BAS Agent Register.

If you are not a BAS Agent, ABN BAS can provide BAS Services for your clients through a structured program which we refer to as Quality Assurance Reviews & BAS Lodgement. The program is underpinned by the ‘BAS Wizard’, a sophisticated Microsoft Excel workbook that was designed and created by ABN BAS. Broadly, you enter key information for your client’s BAS into the BAS Wizard, attaching certain reports, and then send the completed BAS Wizard file through to us. We perform a quality assurance review on the file, work with you to correct any errors, and then lodge the BAS on behalf of your client. More information on this service can be found by logging into the Members Centre and clicking ABN BAS.

The work that you perform when completing the BAS Wizard, as well as the work that you perform in the lead-up to the BAS (for example, coding tax invoices and transferring data into a software program) all counts as hours of relevant experience as you will, in effect, be working under our “supervision and control” in accruing those hours. (Please note, however, that we do not consider our “supervision and control” to extend to payroll services, including superannuation; we have a separate FAQ which outlines our stance on these services.)

When the time comes for you to apply for your BAS agent registration, ABN BAS can prepare and “sign off” on the Statement of relevant experience for BAS agent form which you will be required to submit to the TPB.

What is the process for obtaining an ABN BAS Statement of Relevant Experience?

Simply log into the Members Centre, choose ABN BAS, and then click Statement of Relevant Experience.