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- Login to your actionstep system with a user which is an Administrator (Administrator System Role)
- Go to Admin > Accounting > Tax Return Plugins
- If you have a record in this list with the identifier of “Au_Ato_BusinessActivityStatement” then skip this step, otherwise…
- Click “+Install Plugin” at the top-right of the list view
- Select “Au_Ato_BusinessActivityStatement” for the Plugin Identifier and enter a display name of “Business Activity Statement (BAS)” then press the Submit button.
- Go to Admin > Accounting > Tax Return Settings
- If you have a record in this list with the identifier of “Au_Ato_BusinessActivityStatement” then skip this step, otherwise…
- Click “+Install Plugin” at the top right of the list
- Select “Au_Ato_BusinessActivityStatement” for the Plugin Identifier and enter a display name of “Business Activity Statement (BAS)” then press the Submit button.
- After installed, click the Identifier (Au_Ato_BusinessActivityStatement) on the list view to edit the properties.
- Ensure your Calculation Method and GST Accounting Basis are set correctly.
- Select a GST Payment/Refund allocation method.
- i. “Leave “Leave Payments/refund in the GST Payments Account” will keep accruing values in your GST system accounts so the balance of those accounts will keep growing over time.
- ii. “Reverse “Reverse payments/refunds back into GST Paid/Collections Accounts (Zero out balances)” will create GL entries to offset any amounts used in the BAS against any GST system accounts so that the running balance of the GST accounts would be your outstanding liability for any future BAS return. Most people chose this option as it allows you to look at the GST accounts to approximate your liability for future returns.
- Review your settings to ensure they are correct and save the form.
- Go to Admin > Accounting > System Accounts
- Ensure you have ALL of the GST system accounts mapped to their correct GL accounts for the AUD currency. If they are mapped incorrectly and you have been using GST in actionstep, you may need to contact Actionstep to get the historic data corrected to allow the BAS to calculate properly. These accounts are usually all Liability accounts:
- “GST Collected” - this is where Sales Invoice tax component is posted to.
- “GST Paid” – this is where Purchase/Supplier Invoice tax component is posted to
- “GST Input Tax Adjustment” – this is where any Sales Invoice tax adjustments are posted to. Use this in General Journal (GJ) transactions if you need to make a manual adjustment to cope with an error in previous returns or to account for data that is not a regular Sale or Withdrawal.
- “GST Output Tax Adjustment” – this is where any Purchase/Supplier invoice tax adjustments are posted to. Use this in General Journal (GJ) transactions if you need to make a manual adjustment to cope with an error in previous returns or to account for data that is not a regular Purchase or Deposit.
- “GST Payments/Refunds” – this is where the system posts payments or refunds to (this is not a bank account!!)
- Go to Admin > Accounting > Tax Codes & Rates
- Ensure that your system has all the tax codes configured that are applicable to your business. The actionstep BAS calculations use the text inside the “CODE” field to determine where entries with this tax code should appear on the BAS so it is critical that you follow our naming conventions if you customize your tax codes. Below is our Ruleset (logic is run in this order and the first applicable rule applies). Please refer to the list of good tax codes for examples of what we recommend using. Our logic is based off the “PERCENT” values and the key words in the “CODE” field – for example a code with 0% tax and “Capital” in the code would be associated with "Capital GST Free” but a tax code with “Capital” and “Import” in the code would be associated with “Capital on Import GST Free”. See our List of recommended Tax Codes below for examples of what we recommend using.
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