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Super contributions · high incomes

Division 293: the extra 15% above $250,000

Put in the figures from your return and your fund to see whether the extra 15% applies.

ATO Division 293 rules · verified

Division 293 rules verified against the official sources — how we check.

Checking a notice you have received? It is for a year that has already ended, so pick that one.

From your tax return. Estimating? It is your pay less any salary sacrifice and deductions.

Everything your employer paid in, including the guarantee, plus salary sacrifice and any personal contribution you claimed as a deduction. All funds together.

Enter a loss as a positive number. It is added back, so it raises the figure tested.

Only available if your total super balance was under $500,000 at the previous 30 June. Leave at zero if you are not sure.

Division 293 tax

$2,670

15% of $17,800 — the lesser of your counted contributions and how far you are over $250,000.

Contributions taxed 15% only $11,000Caught by Division 293 $17,800

How it’s made up

Taxable income$239,000
Division 293 income$239,000
Concessional contributions$28,800
Income plus counted contributions$267,800
Over the $250,000 threshold$17,800
Taxed: the lesser of the two$17,800
Division 293 tax at 15%$2,670

Your counted contributions now cost 24.3% in tax all told, against 47% on the same dollar taken as pay.

Where you sit against $250,000

Enter your details above to see this.

General information, worked from the ATO’s published method. Your notice is assessed on what your return and your funds actually report, so check those figures against it.

Why your contributions count twice

The test in section 293-20 of the Income Tax Assessment Act adds two things together: your income, leaving out super contributions, and your concessional contributions. If the total is more than $250,000, you are taxed on the smaller of two figures — the contributions themselves, or the amount you are over.

So the contributions do two jobs. Take a $240,000 salary: after the standard deduction, $239,000 of taxable income is under the threshold on its own, but the employer’s 12% guarantee of $28,800 carries the total to $267,800. Only $17,800 of that is over, so only $17,800 is taxed, and the bill is $2,670.

The ATO’s own illustration runs the same way: $240,000 of Division 293 income and $15,000 of contributions make $255,000, the lesser of $15,000 and the $5,000 over is $5,000, and 15% of that is $750. The threshold has been $250,000 since 2017-18 and is written into the Act as a dollar figure, so it does not rise with wages.

What counts as income

Not just taxable income. The ATO uses the same income test as the Medicare levy surcharge, without the super contributions, which means adding:

  • reportable fringe benefits
  • net financial investment loss
  • net rental property loss
  • net amount on which family trust distribution tax has been paid

and taking off any super lump sum taxed elements with a zero tax rate and any assessable first home super saver released amount. A loss on an investment property therefore pushes the figure up: it is added back.

It also catches a single unusual year. A capital gain, back pay or a termination payment counts in the year it is received, so someone who is nowhere near the threshold in an ordinary year can be over it the year they are made redundant — the redundancy calculator shows how much of a payout is taxable income.

What counts as a contribution

Concessional contributions: everything your employer pays in, including the 12% guarantee, plus salary sacrifice and personal contributions you claim as a tax deduction. Contributions to every fund you have are added together.

Anything over your concessional cap is the exception. Excess contributions are taxed as part of your income instead, so they are already inside your taxable income, and section 293-25 takes them off the contributions side so they are not counted twice. The general cap is $32,500 for 2026-27; it was $30,000 for 2025-26.

Two quieter rules. Contributions an employer paid under the super guarantee amnesty do not count at all. And Division 293 has no discretion in it: if excess contributions are disregarded or moved to another year under the excess contributions rules, they keep their concessional treatment and come back into this calculation.

Is salary sacrificing still worth it?

On tax alone, yes, and the sum is short. Caught contributions are taxed 15% in the fund and 15% more here: 30% in all. The same dollar taken as pay at the top rate costs about 47% in income tax and Medicare levy. Division 293 halves the concession; it does not take it away. The tighter limit at these incomes is the cap, not Division 293: your employer’s guarantee already uses most of it — the salary sacrifice super calculator works out what is left and what sacrificing the rest is worth.

When the bill arrives, and how to pay it

The ATO assesses Division 293 only once it has both your tax return and your fund’s report of what was contributed, so the notice comes once both have arrived, not when you lodge. If you use myTax it goes to your myGov inbox. A second fund that reports late can produce an amended notice.

  • It is due 21 days after the notice is issued (section 293-65). Paying by then avoids interest.
  • You can pay it yourself, or have your super pay it. To use super, lodge an election within 60 days of the assessment. The election cannot be withdrawn, and the 60 days do not move the due date.
  • If a figure on the notice looks wrong, check it against the two things it is built from: your tax return and your fund’s report of what was contributed.

What this does not work out

It leaves out these: family trust distribution tax amounts, zero-rate super lump sum elements, first home super saver releases, defined benefit contributions and their deferral, the exemptions for state higher-level office holders and Commonwealth judges, and super guarantee amnesty contributions, which do not count and should be left out of the contributions figure. State higher-level office holders and Commonwealth judges have contributions that are left out of the tax but still count towards the threshold. A former temporary resident who has received a departing Australia super payment can apply to have Division 293 they paid refunded.

Frequently asked questions

Why did I get a Division 293 notice when I earn less than $250,000?
Because the test adds your super contributions to your income before comparing the total with $250,000. Somebody with $225,000 of taxable income and $30,000 of employer contributions is at $255,000, which is $5,000 over, so the notice charges 15% of $5,000: $750. Two other things lift people over without a pay rise — a reportable fringe benefit, and a negatively geared property or share portfolio, whose loss is added back rather than taken off. And a single good year can do it: a capital gain, back pay or a termination payment all count in the year they land.
Can I reduce or avoid Division 293 tax?
Only by having less income or fewer concessional contributions in the year, and the second usually costs more than it saves. Take a dollar out of super and put it back in your pay: your income rises by the dollar your contributions fall by, so the total the test looks at does not change. Unless every one of your contributions is already caught, the Division 293 bill does not change either — you avoid 15c of fund tax and pay roughly 47c of income tax and Medicare instead, at the top rate, about 32c worse for every dollar moved. Only when all your contributions are caught does the dollar also escape 15c of Division 293, and even then you are about 17c worse. Division 293 halves the super concession for high earners; it does not remove it. What is worth checking is whether every amount on the notice is really yours: it is built from your tax return and your fund's report of what was contributed, and a second fund that reports late can produce an amended notice.
Does Division 293 come out of my super automatically?
No. The notice is a bill addressed to you, and nothing leaves your fund unless you ask for it. If you want your super to pay it, you lodge an election — online through ATO online services, under Super, then Manage. Two traps: the election cannot be withdrawn once lodged, and making it does not buy you time, because the bill is still due by the date on the notice. Anything released beyond the Division 293 amount goes to any other tax or government debt first, and only then comes back to you.
Do carried-forward contributions count for Division 293?
Yes, all of them. When unused cap from earlier years lets you contribute more without going over, every contribution inside that higher cap is counted for Division 293. That has an odd consequence: using the carry-forward can raise your Division 293 bill on the same money, because a contribution that would otherwise have been excess — taxed as income and left out of the contributions side — becomes a counted one. The calculator above lets you enter a carried-forward amount so you can see the difference.
What if I have a defined benefit fund?
You are still assessed, but the part of the tax that relates to the defined benefit interest is not payable yet. It goes into a debt account with the ATO and waits until an end benefit is paid from that interest. Interest is added each 30 June at the average 10-year Treasury bond rate, which was 4.6148% for 2025-26, unless you pay the debt down voluntarily before then. Most defined benefit funds cannot release money to pay it, so check before lodging an election. This calculator does not work out a defined benefit interest's notional contributions.

Where these rules come from

How we check sets out how every figure on this site is verified.