guidance / external / 11 August2015 / UNCLASSIFIED
format / Audience / Date / Classification
/ File Ref: / [G036]

ABN UNKNOWN to SMSF SERVICE PROVIDER

Purpose

Thisdocument provides guidance on what SMSF messaging providers must do if they receive a Contribution Transaction Request (CTR) or Member Registration Request (MRR) for an unknown ABN.

Background

Where an employee has nominated a Self-Managed Superannuation Fund (SMSF) as their choice fund, employers are required to send messages to the Electronic Service Address (ESA) provided by the employee and include the ABN of the SMSF.

It is possible that the ABN may not be known to the SMSF service provider that administers the ESA. For example:

  • SMSF has not successfully completed registration with the ESA;
  • Employee provides the incorrect ESA to the employer; or
  • Employer enters the incorrect ESA into their payroll system.

By receiving the message,the SMSF service provider is performing the role of a Fund and therefore must ensure that the sender is responded to if the ABN is unknown.

Note: If the message is passed on to another provider (e.g. Gateway passes on to SMSF platform administrator), then the responsibility to respondpasses on to the nextreceiving solution provider.

This responsibility must be clearly understood where multiple service providers are involved.

ISSUE

The current standard does not specifically describe what is required by SMSF service providerswhen a SuperStream message cannot be received and processed. There is a risk that,in this scenario, providers may interpret their responsibilities differently. This guidance ensures a consistent approach will be maintained across all providers.

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Recommended guidance

All SMSF messaging providers must implement the following error response message for this scenario:

SUPER.GEN.GEN.11 - ABN {abn} not known to the Message Receiver

Responsibilities of the CTR sending party

Upon receipt of an error messageadvising that an ABN is not known, the sending party will be responsible for advising the employer that the contribution message could not be delivered.Additional follow up contact with the employer may also occur as an out-of-band interaction (e.g. email or phone).

Note: Ultimately, the responsibility to obtain ESA details for the employee’s SMSF lies with the employer.

Responsibilities of the CTR receiving party

a) If ElectronicErrorMessaging part property of the original message is present

The SMSF service provider must respond with the appropriate error response message (i.e. CTER or MROR) which contains a single EventItem with an error code of SUPER.GEN.GEN.11 (i.e.ABN {abn} not known to the Message Receiver)

Error message response timeframe

The electronic response must be sent no more than three business days after the original receipt of the message. This aligns with the legislative requirement to allocate a contribution to a member account within three days.

The following is an example of what is required:

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<!--ConversationId is included in ebMS message level -->

tns:Eventxmlns:tns="

<tns:MaximumSeverity.Code>Error</tns:MaximumSeverity.Code

<tns:EventItems

<tns:EventItem

<tns:Error.Code>SUPER.GEN.GEN.11</tns:Error.Code

<tns:Severity.Code>Error</tns:Severity.Code

tns:Short.Description

ABN {abn} not known to the Message Receiver.

</tns:Short.Description

<!--Detailed Description is optional in the response -->

tns:Detailed.Description>ABN {abn} not known to the Message Receiver. Please check to ensure that the message has been sent to the correct location.</tns:Detailed.Description

tns:Parameters

tns:Parameter

<tns:Parameter.Identifierabn</tns:Parameter.Identifier

<tns:Parameter.Text>12345678901</tns:Parameter.Text

</tns:Parameter

</tns:Parameters

tns:Locations

tns:Location

<!--PartID corresponding to the original part received -->

<tns:Location.Instance.Identifier>Part1</tns:Location.Instance.Identifier>

</tns:Location

</tns:Locations

</tns:EventItem

</tns:EventItems

</tns:Event

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b) If ElectronicErrorMessaging part property of the original message is not present

If the sender of the MRR or CTR is not enabled for electronic error messaging, the SMSF service provider may respond out-of-band (e.g. email or phone) to the sender with information similar to what is contained in the response message:

  • ConversationId
  • PartID
  • Part properties
  • Error message with ABN

SMSF Business Errors

All SMSF business errors are to be managed through out-of-band processes (e.g. email or phone).

Reference to Published Standard

Reference: Schedule 4a – Data and Payment Standards - Contributions Message Implementation Guide and Schedule 6 – Data and Payment Standards - Error Code Management.

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