Businesses have now begun to receive their JobKeeper entitlements for April. Applications are open until the end of May to claim this first initial payment although all eligible employee must have been paid the minimum $1,500 fortnightly wages for April by 8 May for the business to be eligible for the payments.

The next round of JobKeeper payments will be applied for in June and the ATO has just announced that these ongoing monthly applications will have an extended deadline. The original regulations required the monthly declarations of monthly turnover (both last month and a projection of the current month) and applications to be made within 7 days of the end of the month. However this has been pushed back another 7 days to give business and/or tax agents more time to obtain and corroborate the information required.

Of course, the longer businesses hold off applying, the longer it will take for them to receive their JobKeeper payments so the earlier you can obtain the required information and lodge the monthly declaration the better for cash flow. A reminder too that your business must continue to make the required minimum fortnightly payments to all eligible employees and that at this stage no further extensions have been given on this.  Please refer to the ATO website for Jobkeeper key dates (https://www.ato.gov.au/General/JobKeeper-Payment/In-detail/JobKeeper-key-dates/#JobKeeperfortnights.)

If you need assistance with your JobKeeper applications, please do not hesitate to contact us.