If your finances have been adversely affected by the Coronavirus you may be eligible to access up to $20,000 from your superannuation. The $20,000 is made up of 2 lots of up to $10,000. One from now to June 30 2020 and one from July 1 to Sept 24 2020.
It is important to understand that under no circumstances are you allowed to transfer funds from your SMSF to your personal account without explicit ATO approval. If you move funds into a personal account without permission you may face fines for being non compliant and have your fund suspended.
Here are the steps…
1. You need to apply through MyGov, so if you have not got a MyGov account you can set one up at https://my.gov.au/. A video on how to set up a MyGov account is here.
2. Approvals are currently taking 5 days and will come through to your MyGov account and emailed out to you.
3. There are requirements you will need to satisfy before you can be approved to access your super early. They are …
- You are unemployed and/or are eligible to receive a job seeker payment, youth allowance for jobseekers, parenting payment (which includes the single and partnered payments), special benefit or farm household allowance.
- On or after 1 January 2020, either
- you were made redundant
- your working hours were reduced by 20% or more
- if you are a sole trader, your business was suspended or there was a reduction in your turnover of 20% or more.
You will not be required to attach evidence to support your application; however, you should retain records and documents to confirm your eligibility.
4. You should receive a response from the ATO with a week. If approved an Early Access Approval Notice will be emailed to you. Once you have the Early Access Approval Notice…
- Pay cash (Australian dollars) from your SMSF bank account to your personal bank account using “CV-19 early access” as the payment reference. It must be Australian dollars.
- Upload the ATO approval letter to your online portal in the “FY2019-2020 shoebox” section.
5. Note that reducing your superannuation balance might affect your insurances. If you do not have enough in your super to cover insurance premiums or if your balance falls under a predetermined threshold for your fund, your insurance policies might be cancelled. Check with your retail provider to find out what the minimum balance is for you to keep your policies active. The minimum balance required for retail funds is normally around $3,000 to $6,000. If you have an SMSF you just need to ensure sufficient funds are in the SMSF bank account to cover premiums.