Life cover is a lump sum payment, paid to your nominated beneficiaries when you die.

TPD insurance protects you and your family by paying a lump sum payment if you suffer a total and permanent disability.

Trauma (or critical illness) insurance protects you by paying a lump sum if you suffer a major illness or injury such as cancer, heart attack or stroke.

Child trauma cover can be added to your policy to pay a lump sum to help with medical costs and gives the flexibility to afford time off work so that you can be with your child.

Income protection insurance protects you by paying an ongoing income if you are unable to work due to illness or injury.

In simple terms, a superannuation fund is a savings vehicle to fund your retirement.

To be eligible to make superannuation contributions to your fund, you will need to meet one of the following conditions:

• If you are under 75 years of age, you can make personal (non-concessional) contributions and salary sacrificed contributions without needing to meet work test requirements.  This includes your ability to access any eligible bring forward amounts you may have.

• You will be required to meet the work test if you are 67-74 years of age and want to claim a tax deduction for any personal (concessional) superannuation contributions.

• Mandated employer contributions (including SGC) can be made at any age.

• If you are aged 55 years or older you can make “downsizer” contributions, after the sale of your home, if you meet the eligibility requirements. 

These are contributions made to superannuation fund and taxed at the superannuation rate of 15% rather than your marginal tax rate. They include salary sacrifice contributions which are made through your employer or personal deductible contributions. The current concessional contribution limit is $30,000 per year.

A personal after tax contribution to a superannuation fund. No tax deduction is claimed for the contribution.

• The maximum non-concessional contribution you are able to make is $120,000 each financial year. However, if you are able to fully utilise the three year bring forward provision, $360,000 can be contributed in a single year, with no further non-concessional contributions allowable for the following two financial years.

It is a personal contribution that you make to your nominated superannuation fund for which you claim a tax deduction. The amount being ‘claimed’ is counted towards your concessional contribution limit.

If you haven't fully used your concessional contribution limit for a prior financial year, you can make a catch-up contribution to your nominated superannuation fund for which you claim a tax deduction.

• ·You can only utilise catch up deductible contributions rule if your total superannuation balance was less than $500,000 on 30 June of the previous financial year.

If your adjusted taxable income exceeds $250,000 p.a. Division 293 tax will apply. Your adjusted taxable income is made up of your salary, employer super contributions, and any net investment profit. It is important to keep careful track of your salary towards the end of each financial year, so you can keep it under $250,000 p.a. (including super).

You will be able to access your superannuation once you meet a condition of release. You will need to meet one of the following:

• Permanently retire after reaching your preservation age.

• Reach age 65.

• Once reaching your preservation age you may commence a transition to retirement pension, even if still working. The maximum income you can withdraw is 10% of the account balance each year.

• Have a termination of employment after reaching age 60. New superannuation contributions will however be preserved.

If you have met a condition of release, you are entitled to withdraw the whole or any part of your superannuation benefit.

An account based pension is an income stream from a superannuation fund. A minimum level of income must be drawn each year. If started after 20 September 2007, there is no maximum drawdown limit unless it is a transition to retirement account based pension (TTR). A TTR pension has a maximum drawdown limit of 10% of the balance on 1 July each year.

The balance of your account-based pension is measured against your transfer balance cap (which is a limit on how much superannuation can be transferred into a tax-free retirement phase account). The limit from 1 July 2024 is $1.9 million. The balance cap is indexed which means that there is not a single cap that applies to all individuals. You have your own personal transfer balance cap, depending on the financial year you first start your transfer balance account and any increments that have been applied.

A beneficiary is someone you nominate to receive your super and life insurance money after you die. The money is paid minus any applicable fees and taxes. Some super funds won't let you nominate a beneficiary, for example, if you're part of a defined benefit fund.

A non-binding nomination is not formally binding on the super fund trustee and only acts as a guide for the trustee in deciding how to pay your death benefit.

If you want certainty over how your death benefit is paid out, then a binding nomination may be more suitable.

This is a written direction by a member to their superannuation trustee establishing how they wish some or all of their superannuation death benefits to be distributed.

• A binding beneficiation nomination can be lapsing or non-lapsing.  Meaning, if the nomination is non-lapsing, the nomination will not expire. 

• Whereas, if the nomination is lapsing, it will be valid for 3 years and needs to be re-lodged before it expires, otherwise it will be treated as a non-binding nomination.

• For a nomination to be binding, it must comply with certain requirements and be executed in the presence of two witnesses. You can generally only nominate your Legal Personal Representative or a spouse, child, dependent or a person with whom you have an interdependency relationship.

With a reversionary pension, if you die, your existing super pension continues to be paid, but it reverts to your beneficiary. Your beneficiary receives immediate access to the cash flow from your pension, which can be helpful at a difficult time, provided your intended beneficiary is an eligible death benefit dependant at the time of your death.

• A reversionary pension means that your beneficiary is not required to decide about complex financial matters immediately after your death. Generally, a super pension is tax free or concessionally taxed (depending on your age and the age of your beneficiary), so there can be tax benefits for your reversionary beneficiary.

• Amounts received as a reversionary pension will count towards the recipient’s Transfer Balance Cap.

The aim of a recontribution strategy is to maximise the tax free component of a superannuation income stream and/or superannuation death benefit. To achieve this, the strategy focuses on the tax effective withdrawal of taxable components and contributing these benefits back into superannuation as a non-concessional contribution which forms part of the tax fee component.