There was very little trading in the account. I picked 3 stocks and all kids pocket money kept going in. For 8 years no money exited. Gold stock dividend cheques came without franking so no tax hassel there. The kids opened an acc in all 3 names so dividends could be paid in and Comsec could debit and credit.
Effectively we stayed below the radar for 10 years.
Direct electronic deposit of dividends became a difficulty when there was a change of control of a gold company. All details of acc name and bank acc's had to resubmit. As I am retired now and have no income it is best to reluctantly take the dividend as trustee and redistribute via me at my tax rate which is lower than the kids.
The ATO computers are vigilant and DO match dividends/interest to tax returns.
The share acc heading is XXX ATF A,B,C I assume that ATF stands for As Trustee For because Commsec said that upon set up. The SRN heading dropped ATF notation.
So is there provision with Commsec accounts to be "trustee or nominee" and like you said, once they come to maturity, the children will be paid out, not me?
You will have to ring Comsec to ascertain the differences. I don't know about the viability of "nominee" accounting.
Comsec is a gigantic organisation that follows systems. Cheques when they come are named as the account heading. [ acc payee only & crossed]
To make Comsec pay out a cheque you would have to change the bank action details to cancel direct credit so they only draw a cheque -- then ring them up straight away after the share sale to get the cheque in the names you want -- but the names must be on the account heading somewhere !
This was my journey.That is how I handled potential problems. I made bank records always show the correct money path. ATO computer matching has made things more difficult to fly under the radar. Don't know if I would do it again that way but now we are in run off mode.
