As of 1 July 2026, super must be paid for each payday – in line with salary and wages. Payday Super doesn’t change the amount of super you’re paying your employees, just how often you pay it. Depending on your payroll, you could now be paying super weekly, fortnightly or monthly.
The goal is simple: make super payments more consistent, transparent and easier to track for both employers and employees.
It’s about making it easier for those who are doing the right thing and harder for those who deliberately avoid paying their employee entitlements.
You might find that you have questions about what you can expect in the first year of Payday Super. I’m here to answer some of those.
What do I do if something goes wrong?
Hopefully you’ve spent the time leading up to 1 July to prepare your systems and processes for Payday Super. However, even with all the preparation in the world, sometimes things still go wrong.
If you’ve made a mistake, you should fix it as soon as possible. Make sure to keep a record of what happened and how you corrected it.
If that mistake was missing or underpaying a super contribution and you:
- haven’t received a notice of assessment from the ATO, pay the outstanding amount to your employee’s fund and update your reporting as needed.
- have received a notice of assessment, pay the amount due to the ATO.
You can also report your mistake to the ATO by lodging a voluntary disclosure statement, but it’s not mandatory.
It’s important to try and prevent mistakes where possible. Remember, super should be received by the employee’s fund within 7 business days after payday and the timeframe doesn’t reset if payments are rejected or returned in error. So, I recommend paying super on the same day you pay your employees’ salary and wages. This will give you the best chance of being able to catch and fix errors before the due date and help you avoid the super guarantee charge (SGC).
Is the ATO going to penalise me if I get things wrong?
If you’re making a genuine effort to do the right thing by paying on payday and fix issues quickly, you won’t be the focus of ATO compliance action in the first year. This also includes employers who make honest mistakes and take steps to rectify them quickly.
For the first year of Payday Super (1 July 2026 – 30 June 2027), the ATO will support businesses to make super payments on payday and focus our compliance on those who still aren’t paying super, who haven’t moved to the updated frequency or who are not fixing errors quickly.
We understand when something is new you might not get it perfect the first time. What’s important is that you start, give it a go and fix issues as they occur.
We want to focus on helping employers get things right, not penalise those who are trying.
We will use a risk-based approach during the first year, classifying employers as:
- Low risk – paying on time and fixing errors as soon as practicable
- Medium risk – not switching to paying super on a payday cycle or fixing errors quickly, but still making payments based on the previous quarterly system.
- High risk – ongoing late payments, errors and underpayments which have not been resolved within 28 days of the end of a quarter.
You’re more likely to be considered low risk if you:
- aim to pay super each payday
- review your payment methods and understand where to find errors if they occur
- identify and fix issues quickly
- keep accurate records
- have clear processes and controls in place.
For example, if you pay in full, but the payment is rejected due to incorrect details and is corrected quickly, you will be considered low risk.
I paid late, do I need to lodge a super guarantee charge (SGC) statement?
No, SGC statements are a thing of the past! Under Payday Super, you don’t need to lodge SGC statements to the ATO anymore. Instead, the ATO will calculate your SGC shortfall and send you a notice of assessment for you to pay. However, like I mentioned earlier, if you realise you missed or underpaid an amount and you haven’t received a notice from us, pay the outstanding amount to your employees’ super fund as soon as you can.
The last period you might need to lodge an SGC statement for is the quarter ended 30 June 2026. Super for this period is due by 28 July. If you miss this date, you must lodge an SGC statement and pay the amount owing to us by 28 August. Any payments made to funds from 29 July will go towards Payday Super amounts.
You also can’t claim a late payment offset for any payments made from 1 July 2026.
How do I set my business up for success?
Firstly, I want to point out what success looks like. Under Payday Super, success means you:
- pay super for each payday, and it reaches your employees’ funds within 7 business days after payday.
- calculate super as 12% of qualifying earnings
- report qualifying earnings and super liability through Single Touch Payroll.
I hope that businesses are ready by now, but if you aren’t, that’s okay. The important thing is that you get started now. Remember, we don’t expect you to be perfect immediately. To me, success also looks like an employer making a genuine effort to get it right for their employees.
If you need a bit of help getting there, we have plenty of information on our website. You can find information on how to change from quarterly super to paying super for each payday at ato.gov.au/paydaysuperchange, including our video.
How do I stay informed?
Want to stay up to date? We’ve got a couple ways to help you do that.
Firstly, if you take a few minutes now to subscribe to the ATO’s Small Business newsroom at https://www.ato.gov.au/businesses-and-organisations/small-business-newsroom, you’ll be sent regular updates on tax and super news that affects you.
You can also visit our website at ato.gov.au/PaydaySuper for everything Payday Super.
Emma’s bio: Emma Rosenzweig, Deputy Commissioner, Payday Super Program, Australian Taxation Office
Emma Rosenzweig is the Deputy Commissioner and Senior Accountable Officer for the Payday Super Program, within the Australian Taxation Office.
Emma is responsible for delivering this transformational program, which will result in greater certainty that the superannuation entitlements of millions of people are paid correctly and on time. She is passionate about ensuring there is a healthy super system for future generations.
