Getting started with Tax pre-fill
This support note applies to:
- AO Tax (AU)
- AE Tax Series 6 & 8 (AU)
- AE Tax (AU)
This page is about pre-filling tax returns. If you're looking for information on pre-filling Activity statements, see Getting started with PLS activity statements
If you use MYOB Tax with PLS for lodgment, you can pre-fill your client's tax return from an ATO report.
This works for Individual Tax returns from 2017 onwards.
Follow these four simple procedures to get up and running.
Click on each step to see the workflow with screenshots.
Manage all your pre-filling tasks from the Pre-fill Manager homepage. The Pre-fill Manager homepage displays the incomplete current-year Individual tax returns.
There are two options for accessing the Pre-fill Manager homepage.
| Option 1 | Option 2 |
|---|---|
| Click the Tax drop-down and choose Pre-fill Manager. | Go to the client's record > Tax returns tab > TASKS bar > Launch Pre-fill Manager. |
|
|
If your Pre-fill Manager homepage is missing, call MYOB Support.
If you want to set pre-fill permissions for employees, see Changing Pre-fill Manager settings.
There are two ways you can set up the pre-fill file location: with or without Document Manager.
Use the option to set up without Document Manager if you want to save reports directly to your hard drive (or if you don't have Document Manager!)
Follow the instructions for the option that applies to you.
- On the TASKS bar, click Report File Settings.
- In the Pre-fill Report File Settings window, select Use File System.
In Define the root path, select the folder path where the saved pre-fill reports will be stored. Select either:
Use the client's default document tab path
Choose a shared location and can click Browse to select the destination folder.
Ensure the location you choose is accessible to all users in your practice who need to open these reports.
If the SBR Sender Service is on a different machine, such as a server, use a network share path (for example, \\server\folder) and set sharing permissions accordingly for reading/writing files. For more information on verifying if the service is running on a machine, refer to Restarting the MYOB Tax SBR Sender Server.
If you want to specify the folder structure and name structure, use the Choose the folder structure and Choose the file name structure fields. The fields control different parts of the path or file.
In the Define the root path section, if you selected:
Use the client's default document tab path, the file name must contain the year.
Choose a shared location, the file name must contain the year and the Return Code.- Click Save.
- On the TASKS bar, click Report File Settings.
- In the Pre-fill Report File Settings window, select Use Document Manager.
- Click Edit.
- In the Details tab, enter a Title for your reports, and select the Author.
- Click Next.
In the Profiling tab, select the Filing Cabinet.
Ensure that there is a category that contains the pre-fill year/s. Otherwise you'll see an error when you click Finish.Click Finish. In the Pre-fill Report File Settings window, the Filing cabinet and File name fields are populated with your settings.
Click Save.
- On the Pre-fill Manager homepage, select the checkbox/es of the returns you want to pre-fill.
- On the TASKS bar, click Download & Save.
Click Yes. On the Pre-fill Manager homepage, the Pre-fill Status column says Downloading. The file is downloaded to the location you set in the previous procedure.
Seeing something in the Pre-fill Manager homepage table and wondering what it means? These descriptions should help clear things up.Column Value description Pre-fill status
Not requested—No action taken by the user.
Downloading—The report has been requested and is being downloaded from the ATO.
Ready to pre-fill—The download is complete and the report is available for viewing. See the next procedure.
Download Error—There was an issue during download. Click the link to view details of the error.
Pre-fill Complete—The tax return has been successfully pre-filled.
Prefilling—The tax return is currently being populated with the pre-fill data.
Pre-fill Error—The pre-fill import has failed.
Pre-fill Report
Contains a link to the pre-fill report after clicking Download & Save and the download was completed successfully.
Date Downloaded
The date of the last successfully downloaded pre-fill report.
Date Pre-filled
The date of the last successful pre-filling of the tax return using pre-fill data.
The return that you're pre-filling into must be rolled over to the relevant tax year with a valid Tax File Number (TFN).
- When the Pre-fill Status column says Ready to Pre-fill, select the tax return/s to pre-fill
- On the TASKS bar, click Pre-Fill into Tax.
Click Yes. When pre-filling is completed, on the Pre-fill Manager homepage, the Pre-fill Status column says Pre-fill Complete.
If the Pre-fill Status column says Pre-fill Error, click the Pre-fill Error status to view the error. Use the Tax pre-fill FAQs and common errors to see fixes for the errors.Before completing and lodging a tax return, press F3 to validate the return with a list of imported values and errors.