“As a result of this industry pushback, the ATO has undertaken a lot of consultation meetings with the professional bodies, the software providers and the professionals in general around the implementation of event-based reporting,” said Mr Dunn.

“[The ATO] are taking on board a lot of the concerns that exist around the current time frames, in particular, the 10-day period after the end of the month,” said Mr Dunn.

One of the key concerns that has been raised by the SMSF industry, he said, is that there are a lot of inconsistencies in respect to the varying reporting time frames for different events.

While he said it is commendable that the ATO has introduced carve-outs to deal with events that would be difficult for SMSFs to report in 10 days such as the commencement of pensions, these inconsistencies are also leading to confusion.

“This inconsistency is really the main issue at the moment, so if I was a betting man, I think we may end up with end of quarter reporting,” said Mr Dunn.

“There is going to need to be a reporting requirement, we’re never going to get away from that, and it’s never going to be just an annual reporting requirement, simply because we need to ensure timely reporting of events.”