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BAS Reports

Work out the GST figures for your Business Activity Statement over any period.

What is a BAS?

The Business Activity Statement (BAS) is the form you lodge with the Australian Tax Office (ATO) to report the GST you have collected and the GST you have paid. FairBooks adds these figures up for you so you can transfer them to myGov or hand them to your accountant.

FairBooks works out your BAS on a cash basis: only money that has actually come in or gone out during the period is counted. When a payment landed matters, not when the invoice was raised or the bill was dated.

Generating a BAS report

  1. Go to Reports then BAS.
  2. Choose a Start date and an End date. The report opens on the current calendar quarter, and you can change either date to any range you like.
  3. Select Calculate to see your figures.

There is no quarter dropdown. You pick the two dates yourself, so you can run a full quarter, a single month, or a whole year.

What the figures mean

BAS label What it shows
G1 Total sales for the period, including GST
1A GST collected on those sales
G10/G11 Total purchases for the period, including GST
1B GST paid on those purchases
Net GST 1A minus 1B

What feeds the report

Sales (G1 and 1A) come from:

  • Invoices marked Paid, counted on the date they were paid.
  • Other income you have recorded, such as money-in matched during bank reconciliation.

Purchases (G10, G11 and 1B) come from your expenses, counted on their date. This includes:

  • Expenses you enter directly.
  • The expense that is created automatically when you mark a bill as Paid.
  • Spending you record while reconciling your bank account.

When there is other income in the period, the summary at the bottom notes how many other income records were counted alongside your invoices and expenses.

What is left out

Some records never affect your BAS:

  • Anything on an account marked BAS Excluded in your chart of accounts, on both the sales and purchases side. Depreciation is a common example.
  • Owner's funds movements (money you put into or take out of the business).
  • Transfers between your own accounts, since moving your own money is not a sale or a purchase.

Reading your net GST position

Net GST is your GST collected (1A) minus your GST paid (1B):

  • A positive figure (shown in red) is the amount you owe the ATO.
  • A negative figure (shown in green) is a refund the ATO owes you.

Round down when you lodge

The ATO wants whole dollars on your BAS. When you enter these figures into myGov, round each one down to the nearest dollar.

If you are not registered for GST

If your business is not registered for GST, FairBooks shows an amber notice at the top of the report. You do not need to lodge a BAS unless you are registered, but you can still run the report for your own reference, for example while you are in the middle of registering.

Exporting

Select Export CSV to download the report as a spreadsheet for your records or your accountant.

What's next?