Financial Planning for Corrections Officers

We’re invested in your long-term success. What we do is personal, and we take it personally.

Your financial decisions connect, so we consider the parts of your financial life that are relevant to the advice you need:

• Property & Investing
• Career & Income
• Tax Strategy
• Insurance & Protecting Your Family
• Super & SMSF
• Wealth & Investments
• Life Events & Changes
• Business & Wealth
• Legacy & Future Wealth
• Retirement Planning

This is how we help you make decisions today with your longer-term goals in view.

Everybody’s situation is different, so we listen first, understand what matters to you and explain your options clearly before we make a recommendation.

Generally not. The super your employer must pay is worked out on qualifying earnings, and the ATO says overtime isn’t included where your ordinary hours are clearly identified. Shift penalties for ordinary hours are included, and workers compensation payments for time you’re not working generally aren’t.

An award or agreement may require your employer to pay super on more, so it’s worth reading yours beside your payslips and your fund’s records.

In a year with a lot of overtime, the difference between what you earn and the super paid on it can be wider. We can look at your contributions with you and consider whether adding more of your own suits your plan, within the indexed caps.

Your accountant and financial adviser bring different expertise to the same decisions. Your accountant can advise on tax reporting, structures and consequences; we help you plan how cashflow, debt, super, investments and protection work towards your goals. We can coordinate before important decisions.

What an accountant does

• Prepares and lodges tax returns, BAS and financial statements
• Advises on tax structures such as companies, trusts and partnerships
• Manages bookkeeping, payroll and ATO compliance
• Provides tax advice on the consequences of a transaction

What a financial adviser does

• Sets a long term strategy across retirement, investing and cash flow
• Builds wealth from early in a working life, starting with cash flow, a first home and super
• Recommends specific super funds, investments and personal insurance
• Operates under an Australian Financial Services Licence, which is required to give personal advice on financial products
• Handles retirement planning, Centrelink and aged care strategy, and estate planning considerations

Professional roles and authorisations matter. We provide financial advice within our authorisations and work with your accountant for specialist tax advice and lodgements.

Where they work together

• Tax position. Your accountant confirms your marginal rate, deductions and carried forward losses, which shapes decisions on super contributions, investment structures and the timing of asset sales.
• Business and entity structures. Your accountant advises on the structure itself and your financial adviser works within it for investments, insurance and succession planning.
• Cash flow. Your accountant’s figures can help us understand what’s available for debt repayment, protection and longer-term goals.
• Before key decisions. We can coordinate with your accountant on contributions, asset sales and other material choices in time to consider relevant tax consequences.

It depends on the scheme. Workers compensation is separate, through a state, territory or Commonwealth scheme, and weekly payments, if eligible, are worked out from your earnings before the injury. In some schemes, payments reduce after a set period, and some stop counting overtime and shift allowances after a time.

The scheme, its insurer, your union if you belong to one, or a lawyer can confirm how the rules apply to you. We can plan the household budget, a buffer and any personal cover around those payments with you.

Not always. Some workers compensation schemes presume post-traumatic stress disorder in first responders is work-related, which can make a claim easier to establish, and the scheme or its insurer still decides the claim. Whether correctional officers are counted as first responders differs between schemes: some include them, and others list police, firefighters and ambulance officers without them.

Your scheme, your union if you belong to one, or a lawyer can explain how the rules apply to you. Free, confidential support is available from Beyond Blue on 1300 22 4636 and Lifeline on 13 11 14. We can plan the financial side around any claim with you.

It can. A privately operated centre is a different employer from a government-run one, and pay and conditions can come from a different award or agreement, with its own super terms and any cover through work. A change of operator, or a move between public and private centres, can change what applies to you.

When you start a new job, your employer generally pays into your existing super fund unless you choose another; a default fund applies only if you have no fund. Your employer’s payroll or human resources team can confirm your terms. We can compare your super, cover and pay under each arrangement with you before a move.

An overtime pay calculator can be a quick way to estimate what extra shifts may add to your pay, based on the rates and hours you enter.

A calculator may not show how that overtime is treated for super, how an income protection policy defines your income, what workers compensation payments would be worked out from, or how the extra pay fits your budget and goals. Advice brings those into one plan.

Using a calculator first is a good start. We can then plan with you around your own payslips and what you want the overtime to achieve.

Insurers usually ask about your age and job when you apply, along with your income, health and lifestyle, and your duties can affect the cost and terms you’re offered. Custodial, community corrections and youth justice work may be assessed differently, so it helps to describe your duties accurately.

Each policy also sets its own definition of income, which decides whether overtime and penalties are counted, and income protection pays part of your income after a waiting period. We can compare suitable policies with you for the way you earn, and the insurer makes the final decision on any application.

Start with what changes when you leave. Points worth checking before you resign:

• Any cover through your current employer or super, and whether it continues after you go.
• Where your super will be paid. Your new employer generally pays into your existing fund unless you choose another.
• The new pay and hours, compared with your current pay including any overtime.

Any new personal cover is assessed on your health and job when you apply. We can plan the move with you, so pay, cover and super can be lined up before your last day.

Yes, whether you’ve just finished training or have worked in corrections for many years.

There’s no cost for the initial conversation. Any advice after that is a paid service, with its scope and fee agreed with you in writing first.

Bring what you have to hand: a payslip that shows any overtime, a super statement, details of any cover through work and any claim letters. If you’re weighing up a move to another centre or role, tell us, and we’ll start there.