The early release of super scheme was introduced to allow eligible individuals that have been financially impacted by COVID to access up to $10,000 from their super both in the 2019–20 and 2020–21 financial years.  

Within the population that have accessed the scheme, ATO director Kellie Grant said that around 35,000 approved applications have been processed for nearly 19,000 SMSFs for the early release of nearly $341 million.

Within the first tranche, the ATO said that around 22,000 approved applications were made by just over 17,000 SMSFs for the release of nearly $215 million in total.

Ms Grant said the ATO has a range of integrity checks in place for the applications it receives, which help the ATO to mitigate the risk of inappropriate behaviour by those that apply.

“We have commenced reviewing some of the applicants which we were concerned had not met eligibility criteria based on our data matching from Single Touch Payroll reporting and income tax returns and information reported by super funds and third-party data from agencies including Services Australia and Home Affairs,” she said.

Based on Single Touch Payroll, for example, the ATO, she said, is able to tell whether an individual is still employed and how much they are being paid.

“We’ve found that 90 per cent that applied for early release of super had been eligible. We’re in the process of taking a closer look at around 2,000 people who we think are at higher risk of being ineligible,” she said.

“Where we find that individuals have made a deliberate false or misleading statement on their application for early release, we’ll look to revoke the determination allowing the release and assess them on that amount accessed. They also might be up for penalties of around $12,000 or more for each false or misleading statement.”