How to Audit Your Last 5 Years of Super: Step-by-Step (2026)

Roughly one in three Australian workers has been underpaid super at some point — usually a small recurring shortfall the worker never spotted. The ATO's most recent Super Guarantee gap estimate is around $3.4 billion per year of unpaid Super Guarantee.

You can recover up to 5 years of unpaid super under section 36 of the Superannuation Guarantee (Administration) Act 1992. The ATO collects on your behalf. The process is free.

The audit is straightforward — for each quarter, compare what your super fund actually received against what should have been paid (the SG rate × your ordinary time earnings). The hard part is doing it consistently across 20 quarters. The FWM Super Payslip Audit tool handles the math, applies the right SG rate per historical quarter, and flags statute-barred periods.

From 1 July 2026, employers must pay super within 7 days of paying wages under the new Payday Super reform. That makes shortfalls much faster to detect — but it also means the historical audits get more important right now, before quarters fall outside the 5-year window.

Sources: ATO Super Guarantee Gap, Superannuation Guarantee (Administration) Act 1992, ATO key superannuation rates.

Two figures, per quarter:

1. What your super fund actually received from your employer in the quarter. This is on your super fund's contributions ledger — log into your fund's app or website and find the contributions tab.
2. What should have been paid: the Super Guarantee rate that applied for that quarter, multiplied by your Ordinary Time Earnings (OTE) for the quarter.

If figure 1 is less than figure 2, your employer underpaid super. The shortfall plus statutory interest plus an admin fee becomes the Super Guarantee Charge (SGC) the ATO can recover.

OTE is the trap. Many employers wrongly calculate SG only on base wages and exclude allowances, shift loadings, regular bonuses, and paid leave. Under ATO Superannuation Guarantee Ruling SGR 2009/2, OTE includes:

• Base wages or salary for ordinary hours of work
• Most allowances (including tool, travel, uniform allowances)
• Shift loadings and weekend penalty rates for ordinary hours
• Annual leave, personal/carer's leave, long service leave (paid leave)
• Bonuses and commissions related to ordinary hours of work

OTE excludes overtime payments — that's the main carve-out. If your employer worked out super only on base wages and not on shift penalties or allowances, your OTE has been understated and you've been underpaid.

For each quarter you want to audit (work backwards from the most recent — anything older than 5 years is statute-barred under s36 SGAA):

From your super fund app: open the contributions ledger. Filter by the relevant quarter (Q1 = Jul-Sep, Q2 = Oct-Dec, Q3 = Jan-Mar, Q4 = Apr-Jun for the financial year). Note the total of employer contributions received that quarter. Don't include your own personal or salary-sacrifice contributions — those are different.

From your payslips or income statement: sum your gross OTE for the quarter. The easiest way: download your year-to-date income statement from MyGov, then divide by 4 if your hours were stable, or sum the relevant payslips if not. Make sure you include allowances, shift penalties, and paid leave — but exclude overtime.

If you don't have access to old payslips, you can request them from the employer (they're legally required to keep records for 7 years under s535 of the Fair Work Act). Or use your bank statements as a rough proxy and gross-up for tax.

The Super Guarantee rate has stepped up by 0.5 percentage points each financial year:

Period	SG rate
1 Jul 2014 – 30 Jun 2021	9.5%
1 Jul 2021 – 30 Jun 2022	10.0%
1 Jul 2022 – 30 Jun 2023	10.5%
1 Jul 2023 – 30 Jun 2024	11.0%
1 Jul 2024 – 30 Jun 2025	11.5%
1 Jul 2025 – ongoing	12.0%

Apply the rate that was in force at the END of each quarter. So Q4 2024-25 (Apr-Jun 2025) = 11.5%. Q1 2025-26 (Jul-Sep 2025) = 12.0%.

Expected super for the quarter = OTE × SG rate.

Shortfall = Expected super − Actual super received. If the result is positive, that's the underpayment for the quarter.

Source: ATO Super Guarantee Percentage.

The SGC is the legal mechanism the ATO uses to collect from non-compliant employers. It has three components:

• Shortfall amount — what your employer should have paid but didn't.
• Nominal interest — currently around 10% per annum simple interest, calculated from the START of the quarter (not the end) up to the date of payment. This makes SGC noticeably more expensive than just paying super on time.
• Administration fee — $20 per employee per quarter in which there's a shortfall (s32A SGAA). Goes to consolidated revenue, not to you.

The shortfall and interest get paid INTO your super fund. The admin fee goes to the government. SGC is also non-deductible for the employer (regular SG payments are deductible), which is the lever that makes employers want to pay on time.

The Super Payslip Audit tool applies the right SG rate per historical quarter automatically, calculates the shortfall + interest + admin fee, and flags any quarter that's statute-barred. Faster than doing it in a spreadsheet.

Three rules to apply:

1. The 5-year statute of limitations (s36 SGAA): the ATO cannot pursue SGC for quarters more than 5 years before the date you lodge. So if you lodge today (May 2026), the earliest claimable quarter is approximately Q4 2020-21 (Apr-Jun 2021). Anything earlier is barred.
2. Threshold relevance: small shortfalls (a few dollars per quarter from rounding) may not be worth the ATO's investigation time. Material shortfalls — anything over a few hundred dollars per quarter — should be claimed.
3. Compounding effect: 4 quarters of $200 shortfall + interest + admin fee = $1,000+ owed. Don't dismiss small per-quarter numbers without summing across years.

If multiple employers are involved (you changed jobs in the audit window), do a separate audit per employer. Each is liable only for their own period.

The ATO has a free online form: "Report unpaid super contributions from my employer" via your MyGov account linked to the ATO. You'll need:

• Your employer's ABN (on every payslip)
• Your tax file number
• The quarters and amounts you're claiming
• Supporting evidence: payslips and super fund statements (upload as PDFs)

The ATO investigates, can issue compliance notices forcing the employer to remit, and recovers via the Super Guarantee Charge. Civil penalties up to $93,900 per contravention can apply on top.

The process typically takes 3-6 months. The ATO will keep you updated on the status. If your employer is in administration or insolvent, the ATO has separate recovery mechanisms — including potentially calling on the Fair Entitlements Guarantee for some entitlements (though FEG primarily covers wages, not super, except in narrow circumstances).

Phone: 13 10 20 (general business number, super team has dedicated escalation).

Source: ATO — Missing super payments and non-payment.

The Treasury Laws Amendment (Payday Superannuation) Act 2025 takes effect 1 July 2026. Under the new regime, employers must pay super contributions within 7 days of paying wages — not quarterly as the old SG payment cycle allowed. The reform is designed to surface unpaid super in real time rather than after a 90+ day lag.

Two practical implications for workers:

1. Future audits get easier. Instead of cross-referencing quarterly contribution totals against quarterly OTE, you can see whether each pay period's super landed in your fund within a week. The data lag disappears.
2. The HISTORICAL audit gets more important right now. Once Payday Super is bedded in, attention will shift to ongoing compliance. Pre-Payday-Super periods (anything before 1 July 2026) are still claimable for 5 years — but the further you let them slip, the more falls outside the window.

If you're considering an audit, the next 12 months is the right time. Quarters from 2021 are about to expire. Quarters from 2026 are still fresh.

From the FWO and ATO compliance reporting, the recurring patterns are:

• Super calculated on base wages only — allowances, shift penalties, paid leave excluded. Most common single error.
• Super not paid on bonuses related to ordinary hours of work. SGR 2009/2 says these are OTE.
• Quarterly payment missed entirely, particularly Q4 (Apr-Jun) where the BAS deadline coincides with EOFY pressure.
• Super contributions paid late (after the 28th-day-after-quarter-end deadline) — late payments don't count toward SG and the employer becomes liable for SGC even though the cash eventually arrived in your fund.
• Super not paid for casuals or under-$450/month earners — the $450 monthly threshold was abolished from 1 July 2022, so any "we don't pay super on small amounts" rationale post-July-2022 is non-compliant.

If your audit turns up nothing, good — but it's worth re-checking OTE composition. Allowances are the single most-missed category.