Did you know, its possible to reduce your annual tax bill by making a one-off donation to church?

For a while now, we’ve been operating the Hunter Bible Church Christian Education Centre Tax-Deductible Building Fund. Its a long name, but this fund helps pay down our building loan, some of our rent in the City, all of which allows us to keep running many of the programs that teach the bible to kids, adults and youth.

Since we’re about to reach the end of the financial year (30 June), this might be a perfect time for you to give a one-off donation and make the most of the tax-deduction. How does that work? Well, this is not financial advice, but in principle, if you made a $3,000 donation to the tax-deductible fund, the ATO will treat you as though you didn’t earn that $3,000. They’ll recalculate the tax you’re meant to pay, and say, “Oh, it looks like you’ve paid more tax than you should have… here, have some back!”

How much you get back is completely dependant on your circumstances. If you have a low annual income, you might get 20% back. If you have a very high annual income, you might get close to 50% back. Either way, June provides this amazing opportunity to be shrewd with the money God’s entrusted to us, and maximise it’s impact.

 

Donate via Bank Transfer

Name: HBC Building Fund
BSB: 062831
Account No: 10356289
Description: Your Name (for your donation-receipt)

Donate via Debit/Credit Card

Donation via Debit/Credit Card
 
 

Donation Maximiser Calculator

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Please note this calculator (and the outcomes of the calculations you perform using it) do not, and are not intended to, constitute taxation or financial advice. The calculation may not be exact and does not take into account the medicare levy, budget debt levy, pensioner, senior, parent or other income tax offsets. You should seek professional advice before making material financial or taxation decisions.

 
 

  • We have a clear set of guidelines that dictate what the fund can be used for and what it can’t be used for.

    Basically, the fund can’t be used to pay for parts of the building that are designed for Sunday “worship”. But it can be used for the parts of the buildings that are used for education; e.g. Kids Church, Women’s Growth Group, Life, Tuesday Feed, HBC Train, and associated administration, etc.

    All together, those parts of the buildings account for about $600,000 per year.

  • Yes, but that might not be best.

    First, we have a cap on how we can spend the fund, and church needs much more un-tied funds than building-funds. So if everyone gave to the building fund all the time, we wouldn’t have enough money to pay for all the other things we do (e.g. pay for our staff).

    Second, there’s a danger that giving to the building fund is used as a way to give less to Jesus’ kingdom, rather than give more. E.g. If you tell yourself you’re giving $10,000 - but you’re getting $4,000 back from the ATO… you’re actually only sacrificing $6,000.

    Having said that, there are some people at HBC who, since they’re in a high-tax bracket, have been able to nearly double their giving, while maintaining the same level of sacrifice.

  • We’ll endeavour to email your donation receipt in the first week of July.

    However, you only need evidence of your donation if you are audited. So if you know what you’ve donated, and you want to process your tax-return, just go ahead and the receipt will be there for you soon enough.

    If you need your receipt made out to a certain name, please let us know by emailing finance@hunterbiblechurch.org (also, please put your name on the transaction, so we can issue yo a receipt).

 

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