Salary sacrificing super

Salary sacrifice limits

You must check the terms of your relevant:

• industrial law
• award
• workplace agreement
• employment contract.

If there are no limitations specified in the terms of your employment, there is no limit to the amount you can salary sacrifice.

However, when salary sacrificing super contributions you must consider how the amount of your contributions will affect the amount of tax you pay in your fund.

Salary sacrificed contributions to your super fund form part of the concessional contributions in the fund. Concessional contributions are included in the assessable income of your fund and are taxed at 15%. However, there is a cap on the amount of concessional contributions for each person for each income year. If you have contributions to more than one super fund, all contributions will be added together.

Concessional contributions also include:

• your employer's contributions under the super guarantee
• any additional contributions your employer makes on your behalf.

Your concessional contributions cap depends on your age and the year in which the contributions are made.

In the 2010-11 and 2011-12 federal budgets the government announced future changes to super. These changes, if passed by parliament, will change the information on this page.

Financial year	Under 50 years old	50 years old or over
2009-10 and onwards	$25,000 (indexed annually)	$50,000 (not indexed) This is a transitional cap and ceases on 30 June 2012.
2008-09 and 2007-08	$50,000	$100,000

To avoid paying a higher rate of tax on your super contributions, you should ensure that your salary sacrificed amount and any other concessional contributions to your super fund, such as additional employer super guarantee payments or employer payments above the super guarantee, do not exceed the cap amount.