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Income Tax Act 2007

General collection rules - Employment-related taxes - Attributing fringe benefits to employees

RD 47: Attribution of certain fringe benefits

You could also call this:

“Tracking certain job perks for tax purposes”

When your employer gives you certain benefits, they need to keep track of them for tax purposes. This is called attributing the benefit to you. Here are the types of benefits they need to attribute:

If your employer lets you use a company car for your personal use, they need to attribute this benefit to you. The same goes if they give you a loan related to your job, unless it’s a specific type of loan from a life insurance company.

Your employer also needs to attribute benefits to you if they provide you with $1,000 or more worth of benefits in a year in any of these categories: subsidised transport, contributions to your superannuation scheme, contributions to a fund that pays out if you get sick, have an accident, or die, contributions to a funeral trust, or payments for certain types of insurance.

Lastly, if your employer gives you $2,000 or more worth of other benefits in a year that don’t fit into any specific category, they need to attribute these to you too.

When your employer attributes these benefits to you, they have to calculate how much tax they need to pay on these benefits. This is called Fringe Benefit Tax (FBT). They do this calculation using a method described in section RD 50 of the law.

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View the original legislation for this page at https://legislation.govt.nz/act/public/1986/0120/latest/link.aspx?id=DLM1520080.

Topics:
Money and consumer rights > Taxes
Work and jobs > Worker rights
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“ Changing unclassified benefits when companies join or form new ones ”

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RD 48: When attributed benefits provided to more than 1 employee, or

“How to assign fringe benefits when multiple employees receive them”

Part R General collection rules
Employment-related taxes: Attributing fringe benefits to employees

RD 47Attribution of certain fringe benefits

  1. This section applies when an employer provides a fringe benefit by—

  2. making available a motor vehicle for an employee’s private use under section CX 6 (Private use of motor vehicle):
    1. providing an employment-related loan to an employee under section CX 10 (Employment-related loans) but not a loan by a life insurer under section CX 11 (Employment-related loans: loans by life insurers):
      1. providing to an employee a benefit with a taxable value of $1,000 or more in a year for each of the following categories:
        1. subsidised transport under section CX 9 (Subsidised transport):
          1. a contribution to a superannuation scheme under section CX 13 (Contributions to superannuation schemes):
            1. a contribution to a sickness, accident, or death benefit fund under section CX 14 (Contributions to sickness, accident, or death benefit funds):
              1. a contribution to a funeral trust under section CX 15 (Contributions to funeral trusts):
                1. the payment of a specified insurance premium or a contribution to an insurance fund of a friendly society under section CX 16 (Contributions to life or health insurance):
                2. providing unclassified benefits to an employee under section CX 2(1)(b)(ii) (Meaning of fringe benefit) with a total taxable value of $2,000 or more in a year.

                  1. The employer must attribute the fringe benefit to the employee, calculating the FBT liability under section RD 50.

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