Hi Steve,

I don't "think" the same thing, I know it. I am a tax agent and have daily contact with the ATO about clients. If you read my post I said they won't call you UNLESS you are an authorised person and that has to be done in writing. You would know if you are a contact person for another, it wouldn't come out of the blue. If anyone gets any calls supposedly from the ATO, they should simply go onto ato.gov.au and look up the telephone numbers in the contact area and then ring those numbers back. You also need to be careful as the debt collectors for the ATO will tell you they are from the ATO when they are not. The number shown here is NOT AN ATO PHONE NUMBER. place call me 0410 814 587

THIS IS NOT A SCAM. The ATO is contacting individuals in relation to outstanding debts and defaulted payment plans. The reason the ATO requests your tax file number is for proof of identity reasons.

This is genuine however you should never provide these types of answers to someone who calls you out of the blue!

Ask the person for their full name and department, then call back on the ATO phone number as listed on their website and get put through. Common sense!

Follow up to me previous post. After a long wait on their 132866 number for the ATO, he did confirm that it was a call from them. I still would always check first.

It is the ATO, they identified my debt to the dollar.

Some one call me about my tax relation payment & asking me my TFN no & Abn NO.
What do we do?
Anees

Hi Tax Agent, the ATO does ring people other people if the individual/business has added them as an authorised contact to speak of their behalf. The ATO has changed the Proof of Identity in the last 3-6 months so now when the make outbound calls if the person answers with their name, the ATO will only need to confirm one identifier for the authorised contact such as Date of Birth, Address, TFN/ABN. If you don't think they work for ATO they'll provide you the ATO switchboard number and their full name and will call you back in 30 minutes. The Proof of Identity is different for calls to the ATO. https://www.ato.gov.au/individuals/tax-file-number/in-detail/individual-and-business/updating-your-details-with-us/?page=2#Address__contact_details__nominating_a_representative
I know this because I thought the same thing.

The ATO NEVER rings anyone about another person unless that person has provided written approval for that to happen. Even as a tax agent with my tax agent number and phone number on their records, I have to provide proof that I am the agent for the person. And they would never ask you for YOUR ABN, TFN or other details if they are ringing about someone else.

It is a major scam - never give ANYONE over the phone your TFN. The ATO already knows it so would not ask you for it again. Your ABN is public record so no issue.

Received a call claiming to be from the ATO asking me about a work colleague, and asking me to call back and provide my TFN, ABN and other info found on an ATO document.

Claims from ATO. This is a scam.