Quick answer
Yes, you must register for GST as a tradie once your gross business turnover hits $75,000 in any rolling 12-month period — not just a financial year. You've got 21 days to register from the day you cross it. Under $75k, registering is optional. Taxi and rideshare drivers must register from dollar one.
If your trade business is growing, GST registration is one of the first compliance questions that lands on your plate. Get it right and it's a five-minute job. Get it wrong and the ATO can come back years later for GST you never collected. Here's exactly when you have to register, when you might want to anyway, and how to do it.
You must register for GST once your GST turnover reaches $75,000. The number that trips most tradies up is the timeframe: it's any rolling 12-month period, not the financial year. The ATO looks both backwards (your turnover over the last 12 months) and forwards (your projected turnover for the next 12 months). Cross the threshold on either test and you're in.
Once you cross it, you have 21 days to register. The $75,000 threshold has been unchanged since 1 July 2000, so don't assume it's crept up. Non-profit organisations get a higher $150,000 threshold. And if you drive a taxi or do rideshare as part of your business, you must register from your very first dollar — there's no threshold for that work.
GST turnover is your gross business income from all your activities, before expenses. It's the total of what you invoice clients — not your profit, and not what's left after you've paid for materials, fuel and tools.
A couple of things to know. Your turnover figure excludes the GST itself, and it excludes input-taxed sales (most tradies won't have any). If you run more than one income stream — say carpentry plus a bit of labour hire — it all rolls into the one $75,000 threshold. There's no separate allowance per activity. The simplest check: add up everything you've invoiced over the last 12 months. If it's near $75,000, it's time to pay attention.
You're allowed to register voluntarily before you hit the threshold, and for some tradies it's worth it. The upside is GST credits: once registered, you can claim back the 10% GST on tools, materials, vehicle running costs and other business purchases.
The trade-offs are real, though. You'll have to charge 10% GST on every job, which makes you more expensive to customers who can't claim it back themselves — often homeowners. You'll need to lodge a Business Activity Statement (BAS), usually quarterly. And once you register, you must stay registered for at least 12 months.
The rough rule: if most of your clients are GST-registered businesses and you're spending big on materials and equipment, voluntary registration can pay off. If you mostly work for homeowners, staying under the threshold often keeps you more competitive.
Three things change. First, you start adding 10% GST to your prices — your $1,000 job becomes a $1,100 job, and the extra $100 is the ATO's, not yours.
Second, you must issue proper tax invoices. A tax invoice has seven required elements and must show the GST amount (or state "Total price includes GST"). Only GST-registered businesses can use the words "Tax invoice" — everyone else issues a plain "Invoice."
Third, you start lodging a BAS and you can claim GST credits on your business purchases. The GST you collect, minus the GST you've paid, is what you remit to the ATO each period. A practical tip: set aside the GST you collect in a separate account as it comes in, so the BAS payment never catches you short.
You need an ABN first — you can't register for GST without one. If you've already got an ABN, registering for GST is straightforward:
You can often do it at the same time as applying for your ABN. Registration itself is free.
If you should have registered and didn't, the ATO can backdate your registration by up to four years. That's the part that hurts: you become liable for the GST you should have charged across that whole period — but your old invoices didn't include it, so you're paying it out of your own pocket.
On top of the unpaid GST, you can be hit with penalties and interest. There's no way to go back to a client from two years ago and ask for an extra 10%. This is why the 21-day rule matters: the moment your turnover crosses $75,000, register. Late registration is one of the most expensive avoidable mistakes a growing trade business can make.
If your circumstances change — you scale back, you drop below the threshold, or you stop trading — you can cancel your GST registration. If you're stopping the activity, you must cancel within 21 days of doing so.
One catch worth knowing: cancelling your registration can trigger a GST liability on business assets you still hold, such as tools, equipment or a work ute that you claimed GST credits on. It's not a clean exit in every case, so it's worth a quick check with your accountant before you deregister.
If you trade in the UK or Ireland, the rules are different. Both run their own VAT systems with their own registration thresholds — and they are not the same as Australia's $75,000. The UK's VAT registration threshold has been £90,000 since the April 2024 update. Ireland sets separate thresholds for goods and for services. Because these figures change, check the current threshold directly with HMRC (UK) or Revenue (Ireland) before you rely on a number.
Once you're registered, every quote and invoice needs to handle GST correctly — 10% shown clearly, the right wording, and the seven tax-invoice elements in place. Chippie pre-populates your ABN and GST settings so the tax invoices you send are compliant by default.
For the detail on getting those documents right, see our guide on writing winning quotes as a tradie. And once you're charging GST, knowing exactly what to put on an Australian invoice keeps you compliant and gets you paid faster.
Your gross business income from all activities, before you take out any expenses. That's the total you've invoiced — not your profit. If you run more than one side of the business, it all counts toward the one threshold.
The test isn't just what you've earned — it's also your projected GST turnover for the next 12 months. A one-off spike can trigger registration if it pushes your reasonable forecast over $75,000. If it's genuinely a one-off and you'll drop back down, that's worth a quick word with your accountant.
Yes. Voluntary registration lets you claim GST credits on tools, materials and vehicle costs. The trade-off: you must lodge a BAS, charge 10% GST on your jobs, and stay registered for at least 12 months once you're in.
The ATO can backdate your registration up to four years. You'd then owe the GST you should have collected but never did — out of your own pocket — plus penalties and interest. It's far cheaper to register on time than to get caught up.
Yes. If you stop the activity or your turnover drops below the threshold, you can cancel your GST registration — within 21 days of stopping the activity. Be aware that cancelling can trigger a GST liability on business assets you still hold, like tools or a work ute.
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