It's important you pay super guarantee (SG) contributions to the right super fund account to avoid penalties.
SG contributions should be paid to one of the following:
- Employee's chosen fund
- Employee's stapled super fund
- Other fund that meets your choice of fund obligations
Employee's chosen fund
You must pay SG contributions to your eligible employee's chosen fund if they nominate a fund. An employee will generally tell you their choice of fund by completing a standard choice form.
You have 2 months to start paying contributions into their chosen fund. If you have received a choice of super fund form from a new employee from 1 November 2021, and you must contribute before this time, if you don’t pay to the employee's choice fund, you should pay into their stapled super fund or your employer nominated account if the ATO advises you that they do not have a stapled super fund.
Employee's stapled super fund
From 1 November 2021, where your new employees don't choose a super fund, you may need to request their ‘stapled super fund’ details from us.
You must pay SG contributions to a stapled super fund if you have requested stapled super fund details for your employee and we have provided these to you.
If the stapled super fund account provided by us can't accept contributions for the employee, you should make another request for the employee’s stapled super fund via ATO online services. This may occur, for example, if the account has since been closed or a defined benefit account won't accept your contributions.
If the stapled super fund account provided by us is a self-managed super fund, you should obtain the electronic services address and bank account details from your employee.
Phone us on 13 10 20 if:
- you make another request for an alternate stapled super fund and the same, or no, stapled super fund details are returned
- your employee can't provide you with their self-managed super fund bank account details.
Other funds that meet your choice of fund obligations
You can pay into your default fund, or another fund that meets the choice of fund rules if:
- your employee doesn’t choose a super fund
- for new employees from 1 November 2021, we have advised you that they don’t have a stapled super fund.