So the end of financial year rolled around a while ago. I thought “What a great chance for me to check my taxes”, considering I’d not been employed half the year.

I’m glad that I did! I was entitled to a rebate.

Now, I could just use a service like I have in the past such as taxrefunds.co.nz, but they charge something like 15%. That might not seem like much, but when your refund is $1,000, they’re taking $150 just to do something you can do yourself in a few minutes.

The whole process only took me about 5-10 minutes in total, and was surprisingly stress-free!

Here’s how (With pretty pictures):

First of all you need your IRD number

Once you’ve got that, sign up for the IRD Online Services website:

https://e-services2.ird.govt.nz/interact/services/ird/registration/

This will allow you to check things online like your tax refunds etc, just like you’d have to sign up for a Tax Refund-specific website.

It will ask you for your first and last name (Hopefully you know what these are), your date of birth (I think you should know what that is also) as well as a contact phone number and email address for you. You get to pick a UserID and password, and then a “passphrase” that they’ll ask you for if you forget your password.

Once you’re all signed up

You’ll need to ring the IRD on 0800 227 774 to get your account “activated”.

It will ask you if you are calling about a PTS (Personal Tax Summary), say No. Then, enter your IRD number.

When the message asks you what you want to do, tell it “Online Services registration”. It will confirm that you are calling for “Online Services”, tell it yes.

You shouldn’t need to hold long before it suggests that they ring you back (About 60 seconds usually). Press 1 to accept.

They’ll then ask you for your callback phone number. Punch in your phone number, including area code, and then the # key. For example: 098345678#

You’ll say your full name after that, then press the # key again, and the voice prompt will confirm when you’ll be called back. My first call was 2-4 minutes, but only 5 minutes later when I rang back again it told me I’d be waiting over 45 minutes. Your mileage may vary.

The IRD will call you back shortly

When you’re speaking with somebody you’re going to basically tell them you want to “Activate your Online Services account”. They’ll ask you a couple of security questions to verify that they’re actually speaking with you, such as your name and address, but the whole process is usually very painless. If they ask who your current tax agent is, if you’re anything like me and have used Taxrefunds.co.nz then that’s who your tax agent is.

Now is probably a good time to ask them to remove your current tax agent if it’s somebody like Tax Refunds. You can ask them who your current tax agent is. If it’s the likes of Tax Refunds, it’s worth removing them so that your correspondence doesn’t get posted to them.

Once you’re done and activated, you can login to the IRD Online Services website:

https://e-services.ird.govt.nz/interact/myservices/e-services/welcome

Or, go to http://www.ird.govt.nz and click on “Log In” in the top right-hand side.

Once you’re logged in you’ll see a screen summarizing your tax affairs, like mine:

Now that’s great that you’re on there, you’ve got two options. You can either follow through the website and confirm your PTS (Personal Tax Summary) or you can use the following calculator: http://www.ird.govt.nz/calculators/tool-name/tools-p/calculator-pts-calculator-2010.html

To be honest, it’s probably easiest to do it straight from your Online Services login.

Doing your Return

You’ll see under “Income Tax” is a couple of arrows for “More Detail”. Click on that. We’ll ignore your student loan and other things for now.

Once you’ve clicked that, you’ll be taken to a screen where you can choose what you want to review. This is kind of pointless, it should take you directly to which ever option you’ve chosen, but still. Click on INC – Income Tax:

It’ll now take you to a page called “Income tax account summary” and show you the last few years worth.

It’ll either be squared on Zero, or like me it’ll say something like “$123.45 CR”. If it says “CR” then thats a credit, and you’re owed money! Awesome!

Now unfortunately I completed all of mine before I thought of documenting the process so this part is a little hazy on the specifics (If you can please let me know I’d be very grateful), but from here when you’re logged in, you want to click on “My Income” up the top of your main Online Services page:

It should give you the summary for the year of what you need to do, you can either apply for your refund or you can check to see if you need to complete a PTS form.

This is the part that I need confirmed, so if you can let me know specifically what it is called in there, that you need to click when you have a refund owing, that would be appreciated.

You’ll be taken to a page where they’ll get you to confirm several things, and then you should be all completed!

Once you’ve confirmed your refund

Now you need to make sure that they’re going to pay you, and not your previous tax agent such as Tax Refunds.

Scroll down and click on Bank Account:

You basically want to edit them all (Specifically the first one – Income Tax) so that they point to your bank account.

That’s it, you should be done, and your tax refund is on its way! I know that when I do a GST return it only takes them a week or two to get it out to you, so keep an eye on your mailbox.

If this has been of use to you in any way, please leave a comment and just say Hi.