Regulatory & Practice Updates

This collection covers the layer most clients never see: the rules that govern the practitioners themselves, and the regulatory changes that alter what good practice looks like. It exists for a simple reason — anyone can publish tax or lending content, and the difference between information and marketing is whether you can check the claims and the credentials behind them. These resources show you how.

It is written for two readers: clients — of any firm, not just this one — who want to confirm that the person handling their tax or their loan is registered and accountable, and readers trying to work out whether a change they have heard about is enacted law, a bill before Parliament, or merely an announcement. The discipline the whole Resource Centre applies — enacted versus announced, always with dates — matters most in this collection.

How to check that your tax agent is registered with the TPB walks through the Tax Practitioners Board register step by step — a check that takes minutes and that every taxpayer is entitled to make before handing over a tax file number. The mortgage broker best interests duty explains what the duty actually requires of a broker under the credit legislation, and — just as usefully — what it does not, so you can judge the service you receive against the standard the law sets.

The third strand tracks rule changes that shift behaviour. ATO interest charges are no longer deductible covers the removal of deductibility for the general interest charge and shortfall interest charge from 1 July 2025 — a change that quietly rewrites the economics of leaving a tax debt outstanding, and one that anyone on an ATO payment plan should understand.

A note on what qualifies as a regulatory update here. The label is reserved for status-tracking records: each attaches to a single measure or standard and follows it through its lifecycle — announcement, bill before Parliament, Act as passed, then regulator guidance — recording where on that path the measure currently sits. Some records, like the interest-charge change, have completed the journey; the practitioner-standards references describe settled law and simply hold their position. Review cadence follows the lifecycle rather than the calendar: a parliamentary stage or fresh guidance triggers a re-check, while stable records are re-verified on the scheduled cycle.

Resources here are verified against the regulators themselves — the TPB, ASIC and the ATO — and each page records when that check was last made; when a measure’s status moves from announced to enacted, the resource is updated and the change is dated rather than rewritten silently. Start with the TPB verification guide and run the check on your own adviser, whoever they are. The practice’s own registrations and licensing are published on the about page and in our Credit Guide, because a collection about verification should itself be verifiable.