Western Australian Government Increases SME Business Assistance

Eligible businesses can now get a one-off $2,500 credit on their electricity bill, have their payroll tax waived for four months and some licensing payments waived for 12 months with the increased assistance from the WA State Government.

Below is a summary of the key updates.

Electricity Bills

For around 95,000 small businesses will be reduced, with a one-off $2,500 credit available for Synergy and Horizon Power customers that consume less than 50 megawatt hours (MWh) per annum.

The credit is available for current customers (as of March 31, 2020) and will be allocated from May 1, 2020 to reduce current and future electricity bills. The measure will provide some $236.8 million in relief to businesses such as cafes, delis, restaurants, beauticians and small retail stores that have been heavily impacted by recent trading restrictions to contain COVID-19.

For Synergy customers, The $2500 credit applies to businesses customers on tariffs F1, R1, C1, D1, or K1 as of 30 March 2020. You can find out which tariff you are on  page 1 of your bill in the Current Account Details section. If your business is eligible, the $2,500 will be automatically credited to your account on 1 May.

For Horizon Power customers, customers will need to be current customers on an eligible tariff (either C2, D2, K2, L2 and MyPower Business 3/ 5/ 7/ 10/ 15 tariffs,) as at 31 March 2020. If your business is eligible, the $2,500 will be automatically credited to your account on 1 May. You can find out which tariff you are on  page 1 of your bill. Click here for more information.

For contact details for Synergy , click here. For Horizon Power contact details, click here.

In addition, No small businesses facing financial difficulty due to COVID-19 will face power or water disconnections due to late payments. In addition, no interest will be charged on deferred bill payments. For electricity, this will apply to Synergy and Horizon Power customers who consume 50MWh or less.

Payroll Tax Will Be Waived

For a four-month period between March 1, 2020 to June 30, 2020 for small-to-medium sized businesses with Australia-wide annual wages of less than $7.5 million in 2019-20. This will deliver around $165 million in relief to around 10,700 businesses that will not be required to pay payroll tax for this period.

The payroll tax waiver announced today replaces the payroll tax deferral already announced for small-to-medium sized businesses. For more information, click here.

Waive A Wide Range Of Licence Fees

Around $100.4 million has been allocated to waive a wide range of licence fees for small and medium‑sized businesses in COVID-19 impacted industries for the next 12 months.

This includes licences for building services, plumbers and electricians; tourism businesses operating in national and marine parks; boat registration and mooring fees for tourism operators and commercial fishers; commercial fisheries licences; taxi booking service authorisation fees; settlement agent licence fees; and other statutory planning fees.

Liquor licence renewal fees for 2020 will be waived and refunds provided for businesses that have already paid, benefitting around 5,500 businesses with a liquor licence. We will update you with more details of how this will work when they are available.

Businesses impacted by COVID-19 can also apply for an interest-free payment arrangement and for late payment penalties to be waived for payroll tax, transfer duty, landholder duty, vehicle licence duty or land tax.

WA Government Will Waive Rental Payments

If you are a small business or not-for-profit, and are a tenant in a State Government-owned building, the WA Government will waive rental payments for six months. Small businesses include those owned and operated by an individual, partnership or proprietary company with a relative small market share and are not a subsidiary of a larger business, as defined by the Small Business Development Corporation Act 1983.

Not-for-profits include all charities and associations defined by the Associations Incorporation Act 2015.

For more details, go to WA Gov website here. To keep up-to-date with COVID-19 news and information relevant to the SME sector, visit our website here.