1. The short version
If you change your mind before we lodge, you get all of it back. If we make a mistake, you get all of it back. If the ATO makes a decision we do not control, we do not refund the fee for the work already done — but we will keep working your application at no further charge.
2. Full refund of $89.95
We refund the entire service fee, with nothing deducted, if any of the following applies:
- You ask us to cancel before we have lodged your application. We lodge within 24 hours of payment, so in practice this is a same-day window — email us and if it has not gone yet, you are refunded in full.
- We made an error in preparing or lodging your application, and that error caused it to be rejected or delayed.
- We lodged something you did not ask for, or charged you for an add-on you did not select.
- We fail to lodge your application at all within 5 business days of payment, for any reason attributable to us.
- You already hold an active ABN for the same entity and we lodged a duplicate application without telling you first.
Approved refunds are returned to the card you paid with. We action them within 2 business days of agreeing the refund; your bank then takes its own time, typically 3 to 10 business days, and that part is outside our control.
3. What is deducted
Nothing is deducted from a refund granted under section 2 — you receive the full $89.95, and we absorb the payment processing cost ourselves.
Two things are genuinely non-refundable once incurred, because we have paid them out to a third party on your behalf and cannot recover them:
- ASIC business name registration fees. Once a business name is registered with ASIC, the government fee inside that price has been paid to ASIC and ASIC does not refund it. If you cancel before we lodge the business name, it is fully refundable.
- Add-on registrations already lodged. GST and PAYG withholding registrations, once lodged with the ATO, are treated the same way as the ABN application itself under section 4.
4. When a refund is not available
Our fee buys the preparation, review, correction and lodgement of your application by a Registered Tax Agent, and our correspondence with the ATO afterwards. It does not buy a particular decision from the ATO, because no one can sell that. So the fee is not refundable in these cases:
- You gave us incomplete or incorrect information. Where an application is rejected or delayed because the details supplied were wrong, missing or inconsistent, the work has still been done. We will correct and re-lodge it once at no extra charge.
- You already hold an active ABN. The ATO will not issue a second ABN to the same entity. If you tell us you have an existing ABN, or we find one, we will tell you before lodging and refund you in full under section 2. If you tell us afterwards, the lodgement has already happened.
- The ATO rejects your application and requires you to contact it directly. Some outcomes can only be resolved by the applicant — identity verification is the usual one, and the ATO will not accept an agent in your place. We will tell you exactly who to call and what to have ready, but we cannot make the call for you and the lodgement fee is not refunded.
- The ATO refers your application for manual review. This can take the ATO up to 28 days and is not a rejection — most referred applications are approved. It is also not a delay we caused or can shorten. We follow it up on your behalf at no further charge, and the fee is not refundable on the basis of the wait.
- You decide you did not need an ABN. Entitlement is your decision to make and the application has already been prepared and lodged on your instruction.
To be explicit about the thing worth being explicit about: we will not refuse a refund on the ground that the ATO issued a decision you did not want, and we will not refuse one on the ground that you could have applied free at abr.gov.au. If you paid us and we had not started, you get your money back.
5. How to request a refund
Email support@registerabnaustralia.com with the name the application was lodged under and the date you paid. You do not need to give a reason, though it helps us fix things if you do.
We reply to every refund request within 2 business days with a decision and, where we decline, the specific clause above that it falls under. If you disagree with the decision, reply and it will be reviewed by the registered agent responsible for the lodgement — that is a real second look, not a form letter.
You can also call us on +61 2 8014 0888, Monday to Friday 9am–6pm AEST.
6. Your rights under Australian Consumer Law
Nothing in this policy limits your rights under the Australian Consumer Law. You are entitled to a remedy if our service is not provided with due care and skill, or is not fit for the purpose we described. This policy sets out what we will do in addition to those rights, not instead of them.
If we cannot resolve a complaint, you may take it to the Tax Practitioners Board, which regulates us as a registered tax agent, or to your state or territory consumer affairs body.