A Whole New Job

At the beginning of the year I started in a new job moving from being simply an admin monkey to a Salary Packaging Consultant.  Whilst there are still admin type moments (particularly now whilst I learn the ropes) the focus of the job is more on customer service and my broader career outlook is now bright.

My job requires a thorough understanding of particular tax laws and so I have primarily been working on learning the laws inside out.  I have also been producing spreadsheets and reference materials which should help me out further on down the track.  On a side note, it’s interesting how the attitude of my employer is completely different to my old employer.  My new employer helped me in producing a reference guide, gave me time to do a good job and afterwards rewarded me with having it laminated and distributed throughout the office.  My old employer shunned the creation of reference guides and there was no time or reward for creating one.  I am definitely glad that I moved.

As an accounting student I had already been exposed to the tax law, fringe benefits tax (FBT) and salary packaging but I know that not everyone else really understands it.  In fact, based on articles I have read, even so called ‘industry experts’ have little understanding of salary packaging or the tax law.  The principles of FBT and salary packaging are simple but the application is not.  There are subtle intricacies that many don’t understand and as such many falsehoods exist about salary packaging.

So what is salary packaging?
The concept of salary packaging goes back a long way.  Some wise employer worked out that if an employee was paid in things (cars, clothes, houses, etc) then the employee would not incur any income tax because income tax is only collected on cash salary or wages.  Salary packaging still exists today; although the government has taken measures to stop blatant tax evasion.

What is Fringe Benefits Tax?
FBT is the tax imposed on the other things an employer provides it’s employees.  Unlike income tax, the tax rate is set at the highest marginal tax rate to discourage employers paying employees with things.  FBT closes the loophole and stops employees from evading income tax.  It is also somewhat preventative because very few have to pay the highest rate of tax and even when they do, they still save comparatively because of the marginal tax system.

A Happy Medium
Because of FBT the perception that salary packaging is ineffective (and in some people’s mind illegal) prevailed and the people packaging stopped.  Well.  It’s not that simple.  The government did understand the benefits of salary packaging to both the employer and employee however they didn’t want those with the knowledge and ability to avoid paying tax whilst others (who didn’t know or couldn’t do) had to pay.  As such, some concessions were built into the law to allow for certain benefits to be packaged and for certain organisations to be exempt or treated concessionally by the tax.  This meant they could stop exploitation of the tax system but still encourage particular employers by providing tax incentives.  For example, charity workers provide a public good and so have the ability to salary package and pay no FBT in certain circumstances.

As you can see, the principles are relatively simple.  The law is complicated, confusing and constantly changing but the principles remain the same.  However, people’s perceptions of salary packaging need to change.  If things are too difficult for you to understand, ask someone who does!  Almost every employee in Australia could benefit from salary packaging if only they talked to people who knew.  There are some limitations and restrictions but salary packaging is not just for the ‘rich’ and anyone who thinks or says so doesn’t understand the intent of the law.  The whole point of FBT is for equity in the tax system - stopping the rich from having an advantage.

The best thing about my employer is that they are honest and transparent in their dealings with customers.  Many other salary packaging companies are not and as such the industry is tarnished and people again think of salary packaging as dirty and illegal.  In some circumstances other companies do fall foul of the law and their clients (those liable to pay the tax) have no idea whilst I sit back and hope they are audited.  Let’s face it; the industry standard can’t be that high if after working for three weeks I already know more than people who have been in the industry for years.  That is not implying that I am a genius but that others don’t know, or care to know, what the law says.

If you can’t tell, I like my new job.

I live and work in Australia and am talking about the Australian taxation system.  This may or may not be relevant in other countries.  This is not financial advice either.  If you are considering salary packaging talk to a qualified financial planner or accountant.

Internet Filters - Protect Yourself

If you don’t know already, the Australian Government is planning on introducing a national web filter to ‘protect’ Australians from the perils of the Internet (Electronic Frontiers Australia, No Clean Feed, Whirlpool).  This is despite the negative findings of a report the government itself commissioned and despite the scathing criticism from network experts, ISP’s, end users and freedom of speech advocates.  But the issue is a sensitive one.  How can parents protect their children in  an online world they themselves do not completely understand?  The next logical question is; should government be ignoring the best advise from numerous experts to create policy based on the demands of parents who, by their own admission, are not technically savvy?

Personally I believe that the Internet should not be filtered, censored or ‘cleaned’ (as some ministers will say) and I believe that government policy should be written on the best advise possible and, therefore, the experts should not be ignored - in all matters.  But this only addresses the second question.  What about parents who still want to provide a safe online environment for their children?

Safety for children comes from supervision, rules and control.  Let’s take, for example, swimming pools which are fun but also impose significant risks.  How do we mitigate those risks?  We supervise children when in the pool, we establish rules for pool behaviour (don’t run around the pool etc.) and we control when and how children can access the pool (erecting a fence around the pool).  Hopefully this is all common sense and is practiced regularly by those households with pools.  But how many households with Internet access practice these behaviours?  I would maintain very few!  In fact in many households the children are the ones administrating Internet access which, if you consider it in terms of our pool analogy, is utterly ridiculous.

It is possible for parents to mitigate the risks of Internet usage and provide safe computing for their children by being proactive and following the same basic principles of supervision, rules and control.  All of this can be done in either a low-tech or a high-tech way (depending on the parent’s technical ability) but hopefully you will see that a high-tech option doesn’t necessarily mean a more difficult option.

I would like to say that I don’t recommend the usage of a software filter on the desktop computer (client based) for numerous reasons; the biggest being that, time after time, they have been broken or circumvented too easily thereby reducing their effectiveness.  However they can be useful tools and inexpensive (considering the Australian Government still provides one for free) and do provide a layer of protection which, if maintained properly, should at least slow down mischievous children.

My preference, and recommendation, is to have server based filtering and control software which provides the best protection and can also be inexpensive (or free).  Most households have more than one computer and more often than not one of the computers is old, redundant and considered rubbish.  Well your old PC can be revived into a network server which provides protection for your household - simply by downloading and installing ClarkConnect (an “Internet server and gateway solution”).

ClarkConnect is a Linux based operating system offering a variety of features to provide a safe Internet experience.  It contains firewall software (the best ever created) which stops unwanted access to your household computers.  It contains proxy software which; logs all the Internet traffic, caches websites and Internet content (making pages load faster - not slower like the Government’s proposed filtering solution) and also provides user authentication (users have to log in to the server before they have access to the Internet).  It contains a content filter to block inappropriate websites and is also easily configured to block other sites as desired (say youtube.com).  It contains ad-blocking software which strips out advertisements from websites making web pages load faster, uses less bandwidth and stops annoying banners and pop-ups which lead to viruses and malware.  It contains access control software which can be set up to block Internet access at particular times for particular users/computers - providing you complete control.  These are just some of the features of ClarkConnect and you can have them all for FREE!

But why is a server based solution better than a client based solution?  And isn’t it harder to manage or set-up?

A server based solution allows you to control your Internet connection completely.  You choose what comes in and what goes out.  You control which sites are blocked.  You control Internet advertising.  And you say what happens when.  Whilst client based solutions can offer many of these features they do not offer all of these features.  Then to get all the features you would need to run multiple client based solutions which may conflict and could make it easier to circumvent the protection measures.  Also, as said earlier, client based solutions are notoriously easy to break/avoid.

Set-up of a server based solution is probably more difficult than a client based solution (you are installing an operating system and not just software, and you are also configuring the software in the operating system to your desired security level) however once set up properly, maintenance is easy and in most cases unnecessary.  ClarkConnect is designed for ‘always on’ computers and so even rebooting after system upgrades is kept to an absolute minimum.

But isn’t the Government simply proposing a server based solution to be implemented at the ISP level?  And doesn’t that provide us with all these benefits without the hassle - leaving the work up to the experts?

The Australian Government’s solution is to set up an ISP level content filter only (not all the other cool features discussed).  This solution has been proven to be easier to circumvent than most client based solutions and will exclude much of the Internet traffic.  Whilst ClarkConnect can block all peer-to-peer (P2P) traffic (bittorrent, edonkey etc.) the Government filter cannot.  Surveys have shown that up to 95% of all Internet traffic is caused by P2P transmissions and yet the Australian Government completely disregards this fact.  Since P2P networks are the most anonymous networks most illegal networks operate this way (paedophiles, terrorists, all those other nasty folks).  And still the Australian Government doesn’t care.  Why abdicate your control of the Internet to a government who cannot and will not provide you with the level of control that you require?

High-tech talk aside, computers and the Internet can be made perfectly safe for children by simply following our three principles of supervision, rules and control and these can be easily implemented without technology.  The following are some ideas on how to create a safe computing environment for your children and can be implemented in either a low-tech or a high-tech manner.

Supervision:

• Get involved with your child’s computer usage
• Position the computer in a communal space which can be easily monitored even when busy
• Ask your children about what they are looking at and ’snoop’ by looking at the browser history
• Encourage children to discuss their computer usage and any issues raised by it (what is porn?  why is it there? etc.)

Rules:

• Each household member should have their own login credentials and passwords should not be shared
• Children should ask permission before accessing the Internet
• Children should be encouraged to ask for help if they discover inappropriate content (and parents should explain why it is inappropriate content and how to avoid it)
• Limits should be placed on the amount of time spent on the Internet/computer each day

Control:

• Children should be restricted to accessing the Internet only when a supervising adult is around
• Computer access should be revoked if the rules are broken
• Sites with inappropriate content should be banned or blocked

Royal Melbourne Show 2008

Today Mel and I decided to visit the Royal Melbourne Show with our friend Jennifer.  This was to be Jennifer’s first Show (she is American studying in Australia) and our second show in two years.  Last year however, Mel and I both were sorely disappointed by the lack of sheep memories and also, last year our show experience was spoilt a little by the outbreak and subsequent containment of the horse flu meaning no ponies at the Show last year.

So this year we had two main aims; see sheep and see ponies.  Jennifer is a chicken fan so her aim was to see chickens.  Well … BOY did we see sheep and ponies and chickens - and then some.  Here are the photos that I took.  Some are blurry, some are crap but some are keepers.

The best part for me was the petting zoo.  Ideally designed for children under the age of 5, Mel, Jennifer and I all got into the spirit and petted, cuddled and photographed some of the cutest baby animals around (especially the sheep).  It was tough getting photos of the animals without having other kids in the frame and harder still to stop my hands from wobbling and stopping the blurry shots.  But on the whole we came out with some lovely photos and even more wonderful memories.

Keep your eyes out for the mule, the baby goats and the absolute joy you can see in Mel’s face when cuddling with a lamb.  I love her so.

If you are also interested you can see the two videos that I took here.  One is of crazy baby emu’s just learning how to run and the other is of the lamb who refused to move.  Through all the hustle and bustle of the petting zoo he stood completely still just gazing around at all the silly pigs playing tag.

Mel’s photos start here.

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Free Postage From Cuddly Kingdom

Cuddly Kingdom is an online store of plush toys based in the UK.  For those readers located in Australia, you may already know how expensive it can be buying products from the UK because of the postage fees.  Cuddly Kingdom charge a flat rate of £11 postage to Australia.  What also annoys most Aussies is that the range available in online shops far exceeds the range in physical shops in Australia and the distributors (especially of Nici products) in Australia have a very limited scope of merchandise that they can supply.

Well Australian readers, I have an offer for you.  Mel and I are planning on making an order with Cuddly Kingdom when the winter husky range is released later this month and so we are offering to combine our order with your order to save on shipping costs.  You will get FREE shipping from Cuddly Kingdom and all you will pay is the few dollars it costs us to ship your items to you, from Melbourne.  That’s right … FREE shipping from the UK!

This is perfect for those lower cost items where the cost of shipping doubles or triples the cost of the item.  But you have to be quick as we will be placing the order in a couple of weeks time.  Don’t miss out on your chance to get quality merchandise without the added burden of shipping costs.

Q: Why are we doing this?
A: To see if it works!  If this is successful and there is a demand for us to continue, we are likely to do this again and/or set up a more permanent operation doing this regularly.

Q: If you are doing this again in the future, why should I rush to order now?
A: In the future there is likely to be an international AND local shipping cost - albeit a lot smaller than £11; whereas for this order you will only pay the local shipping costs.

Q: Sounds great, how do I participate?
A: Please email with the product you are interested in buying and we will go from there.  Also email if you have any other questions.

Annoyance on Wheels

Last night it took me 3 hours to get home.  A lovely way to cap off work before the Christmas break I thought.

The problems all started at Victoria Park station.  I managed to get there in perfect time to catch the 9:12pm train.  Unfortunately that train was cancelled but I thought to myself, “no fear, the 9:18 will be here!”  The informative automated voice which speaks from the wall told me that the 9:18 was on its way (albeit with no indication of when it would be arriving).

9:18 - no train, could be late
9:20 - still no train, it will be though
9:25 - I’d better contact my loved ones
9:30 - I’ll press the button again to see what’s going on … “Trains departing from Victoria Park, platform one are; the 9:42 departing in 16 minutes”
9:31 - lucky I contacted the loved ones

But the dramas continued even when I boarded the train.  What is normally a 10 minute journey at most, turned into a 25 minute agonising expose into how crazy British football fans enjoy beating the crap out of each other whilst the crazy Irish football fans just murdered each other on religious grounds and the evolutionary implications of this (as told by the drunken Belfast-ian who was in love with Australians for being able to have a drink with the ‘enemies’ after playing sport).

Obviously missing my connecting train I waited for announcements at Flinders Street, like the screen advised me to do, but nothing came.  No voice.  No man.  No details of the next train.  Trains came, were quickly emptied and hurried off to the rail yard.  Why could they not take me home?

Finally, after many platform changes and a couple of almost gibberish announcements I was on the train home.  Despite a slow journey home I managed to walk through the door at midnight - not bad considering I left work at 9pm.  But here’s the best part, the only people to provide an explaination as to why I was delayed was provided by Dad and Mel’s mum and that was because of the weather.  The best Connex could do was “apologise for any inconvenience caused.”  Very helpful.