Air BNB

"The ATO is aware that some taxpayers are not declaring all their short-term rental income and therefore we are launching an extensive data matching program to identify taxpayers who have left out income or over claimed deductions.

The availability of short-term rentals has exploded thanks to the online revolution, and there is evidence that some taxpayers don’t understand their taxation obligations.

The ATO will now source information from online rental platforms and match it against the information included in tax returns. This new data complements data the ATO has been obtaining for some time in relation to long-term rentals.

Where a discrepancy is identified, the taxpayer will be given the opportunity to explain and if necessary, lodge an amendment.

While improvements in technology are helping people find ways to make extra money, technology is also assisting the ATO to obtain and analyse large sets of data to identify non-compliance.

A range of data will be obtained, and the ATO will match it electronically to taxpayer records.

As well as looking for undeclared income, we will use the information to identify taxpayers who use sharing economy platforms to list a property that they actually have no intention of renting out, so that they can claim deductions that they are not entitled to."