Tax time in Australia

ashman · Jul 4, 2024

Well its tax time here in Aus and don't the scammers know it sending messages pretending to be the tax office or Gov department or bank institute trying to milk our funds by email or text messages and yet people still get caught out by these although we been warned, yes we get these bastards all the time but tax time it just gets worst.
Billions of $$$ get milked every year by people opening attachments from these scammers and yet we get told not too with ads on TV and all and so many get caught out when they get messages that money is owing to them is on hold, click here to get your money owed too you, come in suckers as well old scams remerging after a few years break.
There has been a few raids on people getting caught with machines that send over 3000 texts every minute to unsuspecting people from parcel deliveries to anything to try and catch us out, seems to be a lot of Russian, Chinese and some small island nations as well African nations just to name a few, throwing a baited line out too see who they can pull in and even our marketing places are being hit hard, can't trust no one these days, just got to be very careful in what you open.
Then there are the companies you deal with insisting you give them your email address so they can send you a recite for your purchase and unknown to you they sell off your details to someone else to then find you start to get junk mail from dating services, which I found out recently.
So now if they ask for my email or phone number I give them nothing, they do everything on computers so they can print out a recite.

Ashley

franko · Jul 5, 2024

If I can, I get away from direct deposit for my pay, recurring bill payments to credit cards or even the water softener rental place wants my checking account numbers or I have to pay a $1 charge per bill to pay by paper. No, numbers are not going out. Since the new billing company took over my bills have been a mess. I pay by quarter as it is $15 a month. I'm paid up to September. A couple of weeks ago I received a bill for $47 and change for a month, that was due. I went to their office with the previous bill, stamped paid, and carbon copy of the check I used to pay it. The lady nicely explained what was going on and said she would get a message to the billing company. She also wrote the circumstances on the old bill and when the next payment is due, September. Today's mail contained a bill for $97 and change, PAST DUE. The office is still closed from the holiday. Monday I will stop in and tell them that I wouldn't be as calm as I am, had the billing company gone into my checking account and taken the money out and I'm trying to get it back. I will also say "You want me to trust these people with my banking information?"
My one credit card information is on my computer, because of on line shopping. Nothing at all to do with banking. I'm not smart enough not to do something stupid.

texasSlick · Jul 5, 2024

So she says, "Our computer shows you are overdue on your electric bill, and if you do not pay immediately, we will disconnect your service today"
I says "which account are we talking about? I have three."
She says, "I can't tell you, our computers are down now."
So I says", If your computers are down, how are you going to credit my account, should I pay now?"

Click

Slick

ashman · Jul 5, 2024

I pay all my bills before due date at our post office, but every company wants us all to pay online but I still want a paper bill sent to me so now they charge postal fees to do so, yes I am old school but having that recite stapled to the bill is the only way to have proof its been paid, but with my car and bikes registration I pay 3 monthly and is set up to come out of my bank automatically before due date, there is no extra cost involve unless you don't have the money in your account or one day late paying, doing it this way its never late.
But when it comes to bills like electric, gas, water, rates, its paper bills sent to me through the post but now Aus post only deliver 5 days out of 10 working days now, cutbacks because no one is using postal these days.
Computers are great but hackers are smart in getting our money or hacking company's and getting millions of personal details of everyone who deals with these company's no matter how good their protection systems are, hackers are everywhere.

Ashley

franko · Jul 5, 2024

I've had minor go arounds with the doctors office and others who just want to send me a bill in an email and to pay it on line. I've told them to keep sending a paper bill if they want timely payments. It will be on the kitchen table until paid. An e mail bill will be left behind on the laptop.

marshg246 · Jul 5, 2024

I'm an old guy, new school. I lived in Germany for a long time where credit cards and checks were really not used.

Today, my Quarterly Federal, Quarterly State, and various County taxes; Water/Sewer, Electric, and Gas all come straight from my personal Checking account. Some other bills as well. The rest come from the debit card attached to my checking account (works like a credit card). I receive one bill a month in the mail from my lawn cutting service and I write them a check - the only check I ever write. I use my one personal credit card for almost everything else, but I never hand it to anyone. My credit card bill is auto paid in full from my checking account every month. I pay no fees for any of this and would change banks in an instant if they even asked for $1! I have not paid anyone interest since 2013 when I paid my house off. Before that, I paid no other interest this century. If I get a doctor's bill, it's a mistake and the next time I go to that office I tell them to fix it - I definitely don't pay it or waste my time on the phone.

I hated the old days where I spent large portions of Sundays paying bills! Germany taught me a better way.

JimNH · Feb 12, 2026

Lots of phishing scams out there. I get a lot of texts saying I owe this and that along with a link to click. DELETE!!!!!!!

concours · Feb 12, 2026

ashman said:
Well its tax time here in Aus and don't the scammers know it sending messages pretending to be the tax office or Gov department or bank institute trying to milk our funds by email or text messages and yet people still get caught out by these although we been warned, yes we get these bastards all the time but tax time it just gets worst.
Billions of $$$ get milked every year by people opening attachments from these scammers and yet we get told not too with ads on TV and all and so many get caught out when they get messages that money is owing to them is on hold, click here to get your money owed too you, come in suckers as well old scams remerging after a few years break.
There has been a few raids on people getting caught with machines that send over 3000 texts every minute to unsuspecting people from parcel deliveries to anything to try and catch us out, seems to be a lot of Russian, Chinese and some small island nations as well African nations just to name a few, throwing a baited line out too see who they can pull in and even our marketing places are being hit hard, can't trust no one these days, just got to be very careful in what you open.
Then there are the companies you deal with insisting you give them your email address so they can send you a recite for your purchase and unknown to you they sell off your details to someone else to then find you start to get junk mail from dating services, which I found out recently.
So now if they ask for my email or phone number I give them nothing, they do everything on computers so they can print out a recite.

Ashley

It's mind conditioning. People have been forced to conduct business electronically, and using the phones is the most convenient way. Therefore, they tend to be more susceptible to the scam and fraud which comes over their mobile handheld device. Sadly, many people are not critical thinkers and naturally wary of the evil that's around us.

grandpaul · Feb 12, 2026

I've been handling all of our finances from Day 1, with a carefully crafted structure for setting up autopay from checking, and only sending checks direct to city, county, state and federal in rare circumstances that I have screened. I just e-sent out 4th quarter 2025 IRS deposit to cover income tax, meaning I will have a very small tax bill or a small refund once our tax preparer runs all the calculations from our various income streams. All of our correspondence with these entities is via ME logging into the various entities' secure sites to verify my account balances which ALWAYS comports with hard copies received in our U.S. mail. ANYONE messing with us via the mail is liable to steep prosecution at the FEDERAL level.

...don't get me started on blocking a dozen scam e-mailers every day, and SOMETIMES (1 or 2 a day) appear to come from MY e-mail address! Of course they are NOT from "me", but scammers have a way to encode the "sender" address to APPEAR as though it is from me. Hotmail has no way to block "me" (scammer). THIS ONE needs to get dealt with internationally to eliminate whatever "loophole" it is that scammers can re-code with. Sickening stuff, that...

concours · Feb 12, 2026

grandpaul said:
I've been handling all of our finances from Day 1, with a carefully crafted structure for setting up autopay from checking, and only sending checks direct to city, county, state and federal in rare circumstances that I have screened. I just e-sent out 4th quarter 2025 IRS deposit to cover income tax, meaning I will have a very small tax bill or a small refund once our tax preparer runs all the calculations from our various income streams. All of our correspondence with these entities is via ME logging into the various entities' secure sites to verify my account balances which ALWAYS comports with hard copies received in our U.S. mail. ANYONE messing with us via the mail is liable to steep prosecution at the FEDERAL level.

...don't get me started on blocking a dozen scam e-mailers every day, and SOMETIMES (1 or 2 a day) appear to come from MY e-mail address! Of course they are NOT from "me", but scammers have a way to encode the "sender" address to APPEAR as though it is from me. Hotmail has no way to block "me" (scammer). THIS ONE needs to get dealt with internationally to eliminate whatever "loophole" it is that scammers can re-code with. Sickening stuff, that...

I will not use auto pay for any purpose. I retain the power to review each and every bill, and if it's accurate, pay it. Billing errors are a great way for them to make extra money, and good luck trying to beg for your money back once it's been automatically transferred.

marshg246 · Feb 12, 2026

grandpaul said:
I've been handling all of our finances from Day 1, with a carefully crafted structure for setting up autopay from checking, and only sending checks direct to city, county, state and federal in rare circumstances that I have screened. I just e-sent out 4th quarter 2025 IRS deposit to cover income tax, meaning I will have a very small tax bill or a small refund once our tax preparer runs all the calculations from our various income streams. All of our correspondence with these entities is via ME logging into the various entities' secure sites to verify my account balances which ALWAYS comports with hard copies received in our U.S. mail. ANYONE messing with us via the mail is liable to steep prosecution at the FEDERAL level.

...don't get me started on blocking a dozen scam e-mailers every day, and SOMETIMES (1 or 2 a day) appear to come from MY e-mail address! Of course they are NOT from "me", but scammers have a way to encode the "sender" address to APPEAR as though it is from me. Hotmail has no way to block "me" (scammer). THIS ONE needs to get dealt with internationally to eliminate whatever "loophole" it is that scammers can re-code with. Sickening stuff, that...

Be happy, be very happy! I'm more like 100-200/day! And spam phone calls is at 10-20/day

grandpaul · Feb 12, 2026

concours said:
I will not use auto pay for any purpose. I retain the power to review each and every bill, and if it's accurate, pay it. Billing errors are a great way for them to make extra money, and good luck trying to beg for your money back once it's been automatically transferred.

I ALWAYS review the bills when I receive the e-mail notice of upcoming auto-payment. They've never been wrong so far. They're only main utilities and insurance. If I spot one that's wrong, I'll get it corrected before it's drafted.

JimNH · Feb 13, 2026

Auto pay here for lots but email stating amount arrives ahead of time. Like Grand Paul they've never been wrong.

ashman · Feb 14, 2026

Being retired and over 60 i no longer pay taxes here, i retire early at 55 when i took a redundancy from my job of 31years and living on my self funded super pension, but now i am 67 and now have a old age pension but i paid my taxes for over 45 years of working, they try to increase the old age pension but years ago a libreal gov tried to increase it to 70 years old and of course they got booted out so now no gov be willing to increase the age pension of fear of getting the boot, but the like to.
All worker have to keep working till they are 67 to get a pension unless you are self funder, but our pollies who are on big pays and once they lose their seat at elections they can get their full pensions straight away, the bastards are looking after themselves, not fair to normal hard working aussies, with our low population we are over goven and they wonder why we are in so much troubles here.
The rich get richer and the poor still suffer in the long run, nothing will change when rich people are in control.

Ash

Tax time in Australia

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