Cancelling your GST registration: when you can, how to, and the final BAS

When you can cancel

You are entitled to cancel if you are no longer required to be registered: your GST turnover, current and projected, is under $75,000 ($150,000 for non-profits) and you are not providing taxi or rideshare travel. If you registered voluntarily, the ATO generally expects you to stay registered for at least 12 months before cancelling.

You must cancel if you stop carrying on an enterprise altogether, and the deadline is 21 days from the day you stop. Selling or closing the business, or going back to being an employee only, all count.

Cancelling is optional if you are simply under the threshold. Some sole traders stay registered because their customers are businesses and the credits on purchases are worth the lodgements. See do I need to register for GST for that trade-off.

How to cancel

• ATO online services via myGov: Tax, then Manage, then Registrations, and cancel the GST registration. You choose the date it ends.
• The Australian Business Register, if you are also cancelling your ABN because the business has closed. Cancelling the ABN cancels GST with it.
• By phone to the ATO, or through your registered agent.

You can generally choose an end date up to the current date; the ATO may allow a backdated date in some situations if you have not been trading, but do not assume it. Pick the end of a tax period if you can, so the final BAS covers a clean quarter.

The final BAS

Your last activity statement covers the period up to your cancellation date and is due on the normal date for that quarter. It has the usual labels, plus one thing that catches people: an increasing adjustment for business assets you still hold.

If you claimed GST credits on assets (a van, tools, a laptop, stock) and you keep them after cancelling, the ATO treats you as having effectively bought them out of the business at their current value, and you repay GST on that value in the final statement. Older items and lower-value items may fall outside the adjustment rules, and the calculation uses the market value at cancellation, not the original price. A van bought for $44,000 and now worth $22,000 could mean an adjustment of about $2,000. Ask your accountant to run the numbers before you pick a date; the timing can change the result.

Also report any sales and purchases up to the cancellation date, any GST on business assets sold as part of closing, and any outstanding adjustments such as bad debts if you were on accruals.

What changes afterwards

• Stop charging GST from the cancellation date. If a customer is invoiced after that date for work done before it, ask your accountant which rules apply.
• Remove the words Tax invoice from your invoice template. Your invoices are just invoices, with your ABN still on them.
• Stop claiming GST on purchases. The full cost of business expenses is still deductible for income tax.
• ABN Lookup updates to show your GST registration as cancelled from the end date. Some business customers watch for this.
• If you were paying PAYG instalments on your BAS, they continue on a separate instalment activity statement.
• Keep all your GST records for five years from the date of the last transaction they relate to.

If your turnover goes back up

The threshold test never stops applying. If your rolling 12-month turnover or your projected turnover reaches $75,000 again, you have 21 days to re-register, and the same start-date rules apply. Keep watching the running total after you cancel; FlowFi shows it on the dashboard whether or not you are registered.

Closing the business entirely

If you are shutting up shop rather than just leaving GST, the list is longer: cancel the ABN and GST, lodge the final BAS, lodge a final income tax return with the business schedule, cancel any PAYG withholding registration if you had staff and finalise their payment summaries, lodge a TPAR if you paid contractors in a covered industry, and keep the records. Tell your customers and suppliers, and keep the business bank account open until the last payments have cleared.