What is an adjustment event?¶

An adjustment event uses the Adjust action in Single Touch Payroll (STP — how you report each pay to the ATO). It changes only the totals for your business as a whole, not the figures for any one employee.

Every pay report has two levels: totals for the whole business (the payer), and figures for each employee (each payee). The Adjust action touches the business totals only. It carries a payer record and no employee records at all.

In one line

An adjustment event changes your business's payer totals — the W1 gross and W2 PAYGW — without touching any employee's figures.

Why this matters¶

Your business totals feed your activity statement. Sometimes the payer totals you already reported no longer match what should be there. An adjustment event lets you line the STP payer totals back up. Because it changes business totals only, it never touches an employee's income statement — you fix those a different way.

What you will learn¶

What the Adjust action changes
Why an adjustment event has no employee records
What the Adjust action cannot be used to fix

Understanding the concept¶

The Adjust action reports a change to the payer period totals you sent earlier in a Submit action for a given pay date. Two totals can be adjusted:

Gross — the total pay subject to withholding (W1 on the activity statement).
PAYGW — the PAYG withholding (the tax you hold back, W2 on the activity statement).

An adjustment event contains a payer record and no payee records. The employee record count must be reported as zero. Because there are no employee records, an adjustment event never carries the finalisation indicator, and it cannot correct an employee's details. To fix an employee's figures you use an Update action or your next Submit action instead.

The Adjust action is an optional service — the ATO does not require payroll software to offer it. Businesses can still correct their payer totals through their normal processes, such as through the activity statement.

For accountants & bookkeepers

Under the STP rules, adjust amounts are the change to the payer period totals (not YTD), and adjustments are cumulative — a later Adjust action adds to earlier ones for the same period rather than replacing them. At least one of the W1 or W2 amounts must be non-zero. A previous BMS ID must not be supplied on an adjust action. The ATO also states that child support deduction and child support garnishee payer totals cannot be adjusted via the Adjust action — those are handled by following the ATO's separate child support guidance.

Example¶

A business reported its payer totals for a June payday through a Submit action. Later the bookkeeper finds the reported W1 gross for that payday was slightly too low. Rather than re-run every employee, they send an Adjust action for that pay date that reports only the change to the W1 gross and W2 PAYGW payer totals. No employee records go in the file. The employees' income statements are untouched.

Common mistakes¶

Trying to fix an employee's pay with an adjustment event — it changes payer totals only; use an Update action for employee figures.
Expecting a later Adjust action to replace an earlier one — adjust amounts add up, they do not overwrite.
Trying to adjust child support totals with the Adjust action — the ATO says this is not allowed.

How this works in myaccountant¶

In the app — myaccountant builds the STP report from your pay run. The routine actions you use are Submit, Update and Full File Replacement. An Adjust action also exists, but it is not a routine user action.

Key points¶

An adjustment event uses the Adjust action to change payer totals only.
It changes the W1 gross and W2 PAYGW payer totals.
It carries a payer record and no employee records.
It cannot correct an employee's details or carry a finalisation indicator.
Child support deduction and garnishee payer totals cannot be adjusted this way.
The Adjust action is an optional service.

Learn next¶

General information only — not tax, super or financial advice.

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