TAX - How does Claiming Depreciation on a Salary Sacrificed Laptop work?

Well I guess for starters, I understand Rudd canned the Salary Sacrifice Laptops after the 07-08 financial year, but this is the tax return I'm in the process of doing.

During the 07-08 FBT period I bought a Salary Sacrifice Laptop, which from memory was valued at a little under $1,390 or something.

Anyway, I understand you could/can claim depreciation on a Salary Sacrifice Laptop (provided its used to income producing purposes?)

And it's something like 15% the first year and 30% there after.. And I think you can claim for 3 years or something?

I really need some info, these are just bits and pieces I've heard/read.. Could anyone possibly help please?

My main query atm is do I claim the first 15% depreciation in my 07-08 tax return (which was the same FBT year I bought it) or do I wait until my 08-09 return to start claiming the depreciation?

Also, it's not really used for income making purposes, so I'd like to clarify whether or not that's one of the catches.

Cheers, any help would be greatly appreciated, I need to lodge this return before the 30th May in order to do it through e-Tax..

 

Hmm.. I just managed to come across this;

Fringe benefits tax - exemption for eligible work-related items

Which specifies;

So I guess I won't be able to claim for 08-09 regardless, however I guess if I can at least claim 15% or something in my 07-08 tax return it would be better than nothing.

A reminder, I bought this thing during the 07-08 FBT year and tax year, so I'm not sure if I'd have had to wait till the 08-09 to claim it or not?

 

Hi Sk3tChy,
It seems like you've read the ruling correctly; no claims after the 07-08 tax return. However, in your first post you said that salary sacrificing was canned. I think you can still sacrifice for your next one, you just can't claim depreciation as well.
Dave

 

You are correct guys.

A colleague of mine researched this for a client this week.

All it means is that you can no longer double-dip i.e. reduce your taxable income by salary sacrificing the item and claim the depreciation.

You can now do one or the other. So normally I would recommended the salary sacrifice option as you can get a new laptop each year if you like - rather than drip feeding the depreciation deductions over a number of years by purchasing the laptop with post-tax dollars. Although this obviously depends on how tech sauvy you wanna be!

Just a comment on the 15% in the first year and 30% in subsequent years, these simplified depreciation rules are the rates for assets for Small Business Entity tax payers (formerly called STS - Simplified Tax System).

By memory the effective life of a laptop is 3 years giving a depreciation rate of 66.67% (200%* divided by 3 years) - so if you are an employee using your laptop for work related purposes you would use this rate rather than the 15% / 30%

The ATO actually has a decent depreciation calculator here Tax Tools

If in doubt please seek advice from your accountant.

*200% if asset purchased after 10 May 2006, if asset bought prior to then = 150%