You have received an overpayment if you incorrectly assessed yourself (or your employees) as eligible for the JobKeeper payment.

If an overpayment is identified, one of the following will occur:

• ATO may decide the overpayment does not have to be repaid (typically if you made an honest mistake)
• ATO may decide the overpayment needs to be repaid by you
• ATO may decide that another entity that directly or indirectly benefited from the overpayment is also liable to repay the overpayment – when another entity is also liable, ATO may pursue:
• the entire repayment from you
• the entire repayment from the other entity, or
• payments from you and the other entity until the overpayment is repaid in full.

When overpayments don’t need to be repaid

Due to the extraordinary circumstances in the early stages of the JobKeeper program, overpayments may have been made in error as businesses moved quickly to access JobKeeper payments.

If a JobKeeper overpayment is identified, ATO may decide the overpayment does not have to be repaid, particularly if there was an honest mistake. This decision is made on the facts and circumstances of each case.

Factors ATO may consider include whether:

• you relied in good faith on a statement made by an employee in their nomination notice
• you fully passed on the benefit of the JobKeeper payment to the relevant employee
• the mistake was made earlier in JobKeeper when there was less public guidance.

When overpayments need to be repaid

If ATO identifies you have received an overpayment of JobKeeper that you need to repay, ATO will write to you to let you know:

• why they think there has been an overpayment
• how much you need to repay, and
• how you can make the repayment.

If you can’t pay on time, ATO may help you.

If you do not agree with ATO’s decision to require repayment, you can lodge an objection.

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