gemma1 Posted June 16, 2011 Share Posted June 16, 2011 Hi all, I am new to Poms in Oz and have to say that reading all of the posts on here has answered a lot of my questions and helped a lot so a big thank you! Sorry for yet ANOTHER LAFHA question but I am slightly confused by the whole thing. I am moving out to Sydney in Sept with my partner and have been offered a job working in the city paying $55,000 AUD per annum plus super on top of this. My partner works in retail management so should be able to get a good job fairly quickly and my job is comission based, but I have done some basic calculations on a "worst case scenario" and wondered if someone can let me know if I am missing anything or calculating this wrong.... I have calculated the LAFHA based on $42 per adult per week food and $500 per week on the rent. ME - Salary-LAFHA = $26,968 taxable income Medicare Levy @1.5% - $404.52 Tax payable (15c for every $1 over $6k) - $3144 Total take home pay - $51,451.48 per annum PARTNER Salary based on 35 hours per week @ $20 per hour (most of the casual/retail bar jobs I have seen are around this level) - $36,400 Medicare levy - $546 Tax $4560 (15% - 15c for every $1 over $6,000) Total take home - $2607.83 So our combined will be $6895.45???? Can anyone help with this??? xxx:wacko::wacko: Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gemma1 Posted June 16, 2011 Author Share Posted June 16, 2011 Sorry the $6895 is per month not annually. Any help would be much appreciated!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest overrunbycats Posted June 16, 2011 Share Posted June 16, 2011 Hi I'm moving over to Melbourne on a 457 in August so having not received any pay yet I can't be 100% certain, but I've looked into the LAFHA quite a bit and I'm fairly sure that you have to earn the minimum salary allowed by DIAC which is $47,480 for your visa to be valid. Therefore you can only deduct $7,520 from your salary as a LAFHA allowance. Also, I think the $42 per person food allowance is actually the amount you can't claim as LAFHA. For 2 people you can claim up to $367 per week on food minus the $42 per person (so $283 per week) and a "reasonable" amount for rent - $500 per week in Sydney sounds about right I guess?? So I think your calculation is right apart from your income will be $47,480 for tax and medicare purposes. I think there is also a low income rebate for salaries less that $60,000 but not sure if you can claim that on a 457. I have a tax assessment through my firm soon so hopefully they will clear up some of these questions! If anyone has any contrary info I'd be more than happy to understand this a bit more! Hope this helps! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gemma1 Posted June 16, 2011 Author Share Posted June 16, 2011 Hi, Thanks.....I've been reading up on it loads but just can't seem to get my head around it. So if the max I can claim is $7520 I guess it doesnt matter what the rent costs and food costs come to then does it? Does this mean that it would be the following for me then..... $47480 after LAFHA deducted Tax = $4350 plus 0.35c for every $1 over 35k plus medicare at 1.5% - 712.20 total income after tax - $46193.80 monthly $3849.48?????? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest overrunbycats Posted June 16, 2011 Share Posted June 16, 2011 Yeah I'm not sure how it works - I think you will have to adjust your weekly LAFHA allowance so the annual total = $7,520. i.e. $144.62 a week. Not much but better than nothing! I have: Tax = $4650 + 0.30c per $1 over $37k (but can't remember if they are 2011-12 values) Medicare = $712.20 Low Income Offset = ($800.80) Annual Net income = $39,774.60 + $7,520 = $47,294.60 or $3,941.22 Again not an accountant or an expert in any way so don't take it as gospel! Also I'm not sure how commission payments affect all of this - wouldn't that count towards your taxable pay?? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gemma1 Posted June 16, 2011 Author Share Posted June 16, 2011 Thanks.....I think it might just be a case of suck it and see.....but I just needed to know I was on the right track. With us I guess it depends on what kind of job my partner gets....either hes on minimum $20 an hour or he gets something a lot better and we will be sorted. With comission it does count towards your taxable income so I dont think I will even look into the low income allowance as I should be earning comission pretty much after about 3 months I would say. They have told me that realistic com is circa $80k so it seems like we will be fine money wise. I just wanted to understand the whole LAFHA thing a bit more and work out our worst case scenario! How are you finding the whole relocating thing? What are you going over to do? Have you had your visa back yet? We are still waiting......8 weeks tomorrow Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest overrunbycats Posted June 16, 2011 Share Posted June 16, 2011 8 weeks! My wife had her medical today (i didn't need one) and our application should be lodged tomorrow! Now worried as we should be flying in about 8 weeks! I'm transferring with work so all the visas are being sorted through work and they seem confident we will get it in about 4 weeks, so here's hoping! All the moving stuff is going through HR so haven't needed to worry about shipping or anything so that's been good. Just got to let the house and get the cats over (which seems to require more effort than for us!). I work in consulting engineering and my wife is a research scientist. Pretty excited about going! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gemma1 Posted June 17, 2011 Author Share Posted June 17, 2011 Awww that's good....I've heard that they are coming back to people really quickly at the moment so you should be fine with 4 weeks, especially if you are moving internally with work. I'm not actually sure why ours is taking so long but we are not going until the end of August so at least we have a bit of time before we start biting our nails. I would really like to book my flights ASAP though so I can start feeling like it is actually real. How much is it costing you to take your cats? We have a cat but he is going to live with his gran for 12 months until we decide whether to bring him out or not. He is an indoor cat at the moment and I just don't know whether I can put him through flying all the way over there. He freaks out even going anywhere in the car..... we will see. I am devastated to be leaving him though - my mum thinks I'm more upset leaving him than I am about leaving her! He will be able to go outside at their house though so I am sure that he will enjoy his new life as much as we will enjoy ours!!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest overrunbycats Posted June 17, 2011 Share Posted June 17, 2011 We have 3 cats. We signed up yesterday with PetAir UK to ship them over - they've been really helpful and were a lot cheaper than the other firms we spoke to. Not too cheap though - it's still £2600 + quarantine which we have to pay for in Australia! Fortunately my wife's firm are paying for the little ones, as they got off lightly with my firm paying for flights, visa, shipping and temporary accommodation! Not sure how they are going to take it. They are all outdoor cats and I've heard that they shouldn't really be allowed outside over there, so we are looking at getting one of these outdoor runs. Otherwise I'm sure they will cope with lying around on a balcony or something as that is pretty much all they do anyway, and I could do without having to clear up entrails of mouse/bird/frog every so often! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Joob joobs Posted June 18, 2011 Share Posted June 18, 2011 No Allow With Allow Salary 55,000 24,632 Incentive 0 0 Annual Leave Loading No 0 0 LAFHA - accommodation 0 26,000 LAFHA - food component adult 2 0 4,368 LAFHA - food component child 0 0 0 Superannuation 4,950 2,217 Total Salary Package 59,950 57,217 Tax Payable 10,350 2,795 Cash in Hand 44,650 52,205 A Living away from home allowance provides extra cash of: 7,555 However it reduces Superannuation by; 2,733 Net amount is; 4,822 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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