Home · Guides

Claim a Super Deduction: Notice of Intent Before You Lodge

Updated 17 October 2026 · General information · 5 min read

General information only. Not tax, legal or financial advice. We are not the ATO. Check ato.gov.au or ask a registered tax agent. Last checked against ATO pages: 17 October 2026. Amounts and dates marked expected or not verified should be re-checked before you rely on them. Examples use made-up numbers. This page contains no affiliate links.

Short answer: The ATO says that to claim a tax deduction for personal super contributions you must give your super fund a notice of intent in the approved form and receive the fund's written acknowledgment before you claim the deduction on your tax return. You must give the notice by the earlier of two dates: the day you lodge your return for the year of the contribution, or the end of the income year after the one in which you made the contribution. For a contribution made in 2025-26, that second date is 30 June 2027 (our application of the rule). Claimed contributions count towards your concessional contributions cap.

Who can claim and what cannot be claimed (ATO page, last updated 23 May 2024)

  • Cannot claim: employer contributions (including compulsory super guarantee and salary sacrifice), rolled-over benefits, foreign super transfers, first home super saver amounts you recontributed, downsizer contributions, and COVID early-release recontributions.
  • Funds: not certain public sector, untaxed funds, or funds that notified they treat member contributions as non-deductible.
  • Age: under 18, you must also have earned income as an employee or business operator; ages 67-74, you must meet the work test (or exemption) to claim; at 75 or older, only contributions made before the 28th day of the month after you turned 75.
  • Whole dollars: a deduction can only be claimed in whole dollars; leftover cents stay non-concessional.

Steps

  1. Make the personal contribution.
  2. Give the fund a valid notice (the ATO form NAT 71121, the fund's own form, or a letter with the same information); one notice can cover all personal contributions for the year, but you need one for each fund.
  3. Wait for the fund's written acknowledgment.
  4. Claim the deduction at the Personal super contributions label in myTax (or the supplement label on paper). Claiming at the wrong label can lead to an incorrect co-contribution determination, extra tax or a shortfall penalty.

Points to weigh (ATO list)

Whether you will exceed your concessional cap (extra tax applies), Division 293 tax, splitting contributions with a spouse, and eligibility for the super co-contribution. The contributions tax in the fund is 15% on amounts you deduct.

2026-27 limits. For 2026-27 the general concessional contributions cap is $32,500 (it was $30,000 in 2024-25 and 2025-26), per the ATO's contributions caps page (last updated 11 September 2026). Deducted personal contributions count towards it, together with employer contributions. If your total super balance was under $500,000 on 30 June of the previous year you may be able to use unused cap amounts from the last five years.

Division 293 tax is an extra 15% on the lesser of your concessional contributions or the amount by which your Division 293 income plus those contributions exceeds $250,000 (ATO, last updated 7 August 2026). A deductible personal contribution counts as a concessional contribution for this purpose.

A separate tax on very large balances, Division 296, starts on 1 July 2026: for 2026-27 the ATO gives the large super balance threshold as $3 million and the very large threshold as $10 million (ATO search extract). It depends on your total super balance, not on your contributions, so it is outside this page.

When a notice is valid. A notice is valid only if you are still a member of the fund, the fund still holds the contribution, the notice does not cover an amount already covered by an earlier notice, the fund has not started an income stream from it, you have not lodged an application to split the contribution, and the amount was not released under or recontributed to the first home super saver scheme (ATO).

Made-up example

You contribute $5,000, give the notice, receive the acknowledgment and claim $5,000. Your taxable income falls by $5,000 and the fund pays 15% contributions tax ($750), crediting $4,250 (the ATO's example uses the same pattern).

Related

Varying or adding to a notice · Small business offset · Sole trader deductions

FAQ

Can I lodge first and claim later?

The ATO says you must have the acknowledgment before claiming; see the next page for the ATO's handling of variations.

Does it reduce the small business offset?

The ATO says personal super contributions are not a deduction that reduces net small business income.

What we could not verify

  • What to do if you have already lodged without the acknowledgment (a search summary suggests lodging without the claim and amending later; not confirmed on the page read).
  • Whether any age or work-test rule changes for 2026-27.
  • The Division 296 thresholds are from an ATO search extract not re-read in full.
  • The ATO page was last updated 23 May 2024; later changes not checked.

Sources