For many Greek Australians ties with Europe remain strong, both from a family and financial perspective. These connections can go back many generations and often involve complicated financial arrangements. In many cases, people have chosen to leave assets behind when emigrating to Australia, perhaps because they make regular trips back or believed they may return to their homeland one day permanently. However, many families have never realised or understood that they should be paying Australian tax on the income earned from these assets. If your family is generating income offshore or holds overseas assets then there may be no better time to get your financial house in order without falling foul of the tax man.

The Australian Taxation Office (ATO) is stepping up its audit activity. They are examining data on Australians with offshore investments and bank accounts.

They are also looking at information from Australian and foreign banks on fund flows, interest and account balances, as well as speaking to informants about offshore accounts, and money transfers to and from offshore bank accounts.

The Swiss banks have already been required to disclose client information to US authorities and new rules mean that soon they could be required to disclose globally. Information accessed by the ATO will be used to pursue taxpayers who have not disclosed their offshore income. In the ATO’s view, it is only a matter of time before they discover undeclared offshore income.

The ATO has announced a new project that gives Australian taxpayers the opportunity to voluntarily disclose unreported foreign income and assets before these are identified by ATO activity.

This amnesty offers significant penalty reductions and other generous concessions to encourage the disclosure of undeclared income, including income from assets and structures established by earlier generations. The deadline for making a disclosure is 19 December 2014.

The benefits of participating in the amnesty include:

1. The ATO will usually only assess tax on the undisclosed income for the past four years.
2. Undeclared income from more than four years ago should not be taxed.
3. The maximum penalty will be 10 per cent and there will be no penalty where the income disclosed is $20,000 or less in a year.
4. The ATO will generally not initiate investigations for criminal prosecution for tax avoidance or refer taxpayers to another law enforcement agency.
5. The ATO will not generally audit the information provided.

For those wishing to keep their offshore assets it is important to note that there is no obligation to wind up offshore structures. However, this is an opportunity to bring your offshore assets into Australia. In particular, for those looking at estate planning, it is an opportunity to ensure future generations have access to these offshore assets without having to be concerned about whether or not they have been properly accounted for in the past.

This type of opportunity does not come along very often. It may be a once-in a-generation chance to reduce the risk of penalties, other sanctions and reputation damage that may occur as a result of an ATO investigation. The fast approaching deadline means that you need to consider action as soon as possible. It may be a good idea to seek the advice of your family accountant or a specialist that can assist taxpayers through the disclosure process.

For more information you can call a tax specialist or visit the ATO website.

*Sue Williamson works for Ernst & Young Australia. The views expressed in this article are the views of the author, not Ernst & Young. This article provides general information, does not constitute advice and should not be relied on as such. Professional advice should be sought prior to any action being taken in reliance on any of the information.