How to get your tax refund without paying some fool a cut

There's been a bit of media stuff lately about sites you can use to get tax refunds from the IRD if you've got any owing - taxrefunds.co.nz, etc. In these dark times of economic crisis and python invasions it's pretty handy to be able to get some cash back from Johnny Key - but the thing about these sites and the tax refund dudes hanging out in the malls is that they take a pretty hefty cut of your refund (something like 15%), and some of them have a hidden-away clause that by signing up you're appointing them as your tax agent for here and evermore.

So I thought, maybe I should be a helpful bear and show how you can get your refunds, if you have any due, directly through the IRD. It really isn't terribly hard - "doing your taxes" sounds fuckin' awful, but nowadays it's mostly just about filling out a few forms on the interweb.

1. First thing is, you need your earnings and tax paid figures for the years you're looking at. I'd suggest looking at the years ended 31Mar05 to 31Mar09 - you can't request a personal tax summary further back than that. I'm not sure if there's a way around this, but shit, five years is enough. Btw, 2009 tax year = year ended 31 March 2009.

The main type of earnings for most of us will be wages and interest on bank accounts (maybe you've also got shares and/or unit trusts, which need to be taken into account for years prior to the PIE changeover, but if you're that set up you can figure your own shit out). There are 3 ways you can get your wages and tax paid deets:

a) From a summary of earnings from the IRD (if you happen to have been sent one, sweet). You can request one here
b) From a payslip - get the one at the end of the financial year in question and look at the year to date balances. Unfortunately the PAYE figure is NOT your income tax paid - for 2008 and 2009 you will need to subtract the ACC earner's levy from the PAYE to get the tax paid. Historical ACC levy rates -although for 2005 through 2007 the online calculators will automatically do this for you (go knows why the newer ones are harder to use).
c) Set up an Online Services account at the IRD - this is what I'd recommend, it's hella convenient - you can access all your earnings info, check KiwiSaver balances, send and receive secure email, etc. Registration here (I think you need to wait for them to send you a letter with password etc - been ages since I set mine up.

You can get interest figures from your bank statements; some banks let you generate interest-paid statements for each financial year online; or you can ask your bank for the interest earned and tax paid figures for the years you're interested in by calling them. You don't really need physical certificates, but if your bank has sent you one, sweet.

2. Look to see whether you've got a refund due using the IRD's online calculators. If it shows tax to pay, don't sweat it yet.

For 2008 and 2009, you need to subtract your ACC earner's levy from your PAYE before entering the 'tax deducted' figure into the calculator (if you are using a payslip - if you are using an IRD summary no worries)
Personal tax summary calculation 2009
Personal tax summary calculation 2008

For 2005 through 2007, the online calculator will deduct your ACC earner's levy automatically - just click the payslip option (if this is what you're using) and enter your PAYE in the indicated box.
Personal tax summary calculation 2007
Personal tax summary calculation 2006
Personal tax summary calculation 2005

3. Ok, so probably at this stage you've got a few years with refunds due and a few years with tax to pay. But you'd prefer to just get the refunds and ignore the tax-to-pay years, obviously. So, for the years with tax to pay, you need to find out whether you actually have to request a personal tax summary (PTS) and make the payment.

This page gives the broad guidelines on who'll automatically be sent a PTS, who might want to get one, and who HAS to get one. If you'd like to be sure, the online worksheets below will tell you whether you MUST request a personal tax summary for the given years. Most of us won't have to get one - though I have to because of earning over $200 interest while having a student loan.

Do you need to file an IR3 return or receive a personal tax summary for 2009?
Do you need to file an IR3 return or receive a personal tax summary for 2008?
Do you need to file an IR3 return or receive a personal tax summary for 2007?
Do you need to file an IR3 return or receive a personal tax summary for 2006?
Do you need to file an IR3 return or receive a personal tax summary for 2005?

4. Right. So now you know if you have any sweet refunds due, and which (if any) years you HAVE to request a personal tax summary. So now it's time to request the bastards (remember to do a request for each of the years you've decided on):
Request a personal tax summary

And that's it! The personal tax summary will come in the mail within an admittedly whopping 45 working days - although mine were a lot quicker. The IRD will check your figures and usually give you the refund or tax to pay figure that you got from the online calculator (or something close to it - they round off some of the figures). If there's a refund to come it'll go automatically to your bank account within a month after (as long as they've got your number). If there's tax to pay I think you have a bunch of different ways to pay... in my case I had small tax to pay figures for a few of the years (ones where I had to request a PTS) and they seem to just be offsetting the tax to pay against the biggish refunds I've got due for the other years.

Ok, so it's a bit of work and takes a while, but this way you get ALL the money due ya - and based on others' experience with the dodge refunds companies, this way seems to be no slower than getting the money through them. I'd recommend saving the worksheet results you get for the various things in Word or something as you go, btw. Choice!