In April 2023 the Australian Tax Office (ATO) released an updated Standard Superannuation Choice Form. The new form is a visual refresh to the existing form, with a few changes to simplify the experience.
What’s new?
The new form has a visually updated design and a bolder blue colour. It has also removed a few of the fields required to complete the choice portion of the form.
The instructions on the form are now much clearer, tho they still require collating information such as the compliance letter.
The form now has a field for “legal name at fund”, which makes the form easier to use for those that have changed thier name since joining thier superfund (married, legal name change, etc).
The form no longer requires providing the address of the superfund, which is an improvement. This detail felt rather unnecessary in the old form, so it’s good to see that the requirement was dropped from the new super choice form.
The Australian Business Number of the chosen superfund is still required, and again, this seems like a missed opportunity to further simplify the form. The USI and ABN are linked, and thus, one should enable the other to be determined. It seems unnecessary for the employee to provide both. The USI number should have been sufficient for the processing for the super choice form, and would have reduced the burden on the employee to provide details regarding their chosen super fund. When using SuperChoiceForm.com.au to complete the new super choice form, neither ABN nor USI is required to input. Rather the employee simply selects their superfund and these details are added to the form. The ATO could have taken a similar approach with their new form design.
What hasn’t changed?
THe form still serves the same purpose and can be used for providing a super choice, default fund or SMSF option. A compliance letter is still required for an employee to provide their choice of fund. It feels like the updated design could have done away with this requirement, but that choice wasn’t taken.
Where to get the form?
You can download a blank copy of the new super choice form here. If you require a copy of the old version of the super choice form, you can also get a blank copy from the website SuperChoiceForm.com.au
The updated visuals on the new form
Compared to the old super choice form:
