Member contributions statement protocol

Classifying contribution types

When you receive a contribution, you must determine what type of contribution it is so you can put it at the appropriate field in the MCS. The fields are:

• Employer contributed amount
• Personal contributed amount
• Capital gains tax cap election amounts
• Personal injury election amount
• Spouse and child contributions amount
• Other family and friend contributions amount
• Directed termination payments (taxable component) amount
• Assessable foreign fund amounts
• Non-assessable foreign fund amount
• Transferred from reserves amounts
• Contributions made to a previously non-complying fund
• All contributions received for the current year.

The appropriate field for each contribution depends on where the contribution has come from, what information is provided by the contributor when they make it and what decisions you make about how it will be treated in your fund. When you accept a contribution, you need to collect information that will help you to correctly determine what type of amount it is. Generally, you should be able to answer the following questions for each contribution:

• Who is the contribution for?
• Who made the contribution?
• What is the contributor's relationship with the member for whom the contribution was made (that is, are they the member themselves, the member's employer, the member's spouse or another third party - such as 'other family and friends')?
• What was the purpose of the contribution?
• Did the contributor provide a valid notice of election to treat the contribution in a particular way?

Use the information you collect, the MCS electronic reporting specifications and this protocol to help you correctly classify and report contributions. An explanation of each field, which adds to and supports the explanations given in the reporting specification, is provided below.

We use the contributions information you and other funds provide and deduction information from your members' income tax returns to determine which contributions are:

• eligible personal contributions - so we can determine co-contribution entitlement
• concessional and non-concessional contributions - so we can initially assess liability for excess contributions tax.

Sections within Classifying contribution types

• Employer contributed amount
• Personal contributed amount
• Capital gains tax cap election amounts
• Personal injury election amount
• Spouse and child contributions amount
• Other family and friend contributions amount
• Directed termination payments (taxable component) amount
• Amounts transferred from foreign funds