Key Highlights

  • The ATO has started pre-filling trust distribution details into individual tax returns for the first time, a change set out in its "What's new" guidance for 2025–26.
  • The ATO's guidance for individuals, updated on 2 July 2026, says that "pre-fill for trust distributions starts for individual taxpayers in 2026".
  • Pre-fill already draws on information such as employer income statements, bank interest and dividend data.
  • Pre-fill can only be as good as what trustees report to the ATO.

The ATO has started pre-filling trust distribution details into individual tax returns for the first time, a change set out in its "What's new" guidance for 2025–26. It matters now because self-lodgers must lodge by 31 October 2026, while many trusts lodge their own returns much later. Because of that gap, a beneficiary doing their return now may find the pre-filled amount is missing, incomplete or based on early figures.

What the ATO has changed

The ATO's guidance for individuals, updated on 2 July 2026, says that "pre-fill for trust distributions starts for individual taxpayers in 2026". The ATO says pre-fill will be extended to other types of entities from 2027.

Pre-fill already draws on information such as employer income statements, bank interest and dividend data. Adding trust distributions fills a notable gap for the many people who receive income from a family trust or another type of trust. For beneficiaries, a distribution may now appear in the return automatically instead of being typed in from the trustee's statement.

Why trustees are now reporting more

Pre-fill can only be as good as what trustees report to the ATO. From 1 July 2026, the ATO says, trustees must give extra information in their distribution statements, including three new labels: B1 for non-primary production managed investment scheme amounts, U2 for franked distributions related to investments, and H1 for other assessable foreign-source income from a financial investment.

Those amounts feed into the net financial investment loss figure, reported at label IT5 of the individual return. That measure forms part of the income tests used for things such as the Medicare levy surcharge, so getting it wrong can affect more than the tax on the distribution itself.

The tax file number reporting rules have also changed under enacted law. According to CPA Australia, the Treasury Laws Amendment (Delivering an Efficient and Trusted Tax System) Act 2026 (Act No. 58 of 2026, assented to on 30 June 2026) requires closely held trusts to report beneficiary TFNs "at the same time the trust tax return is lodged".

The timing problem for 31 October self-lodgers

The catch is timing. Many trusts lodge through tax agents and have due dates in 2027 for the 2025–26 year. If the trust has not lodged yet, the ATO may have nothing to pre-fill when a beneficiary does their own return before 31 October.

That doesn't change what the beneficiary owes. A beneficiary who is presently entitled to a share of a trust's net income is generally taxed on that share, whether or not the cash has been paid out. A blank pre-fill is not a reason to leave the amount out.

"Pre-fill is useful, but people shouldn't treat it as a substitute for checking their own records," H&R Block's Mark Chapman told Yahoo Finance in late September. Chapman also cited H&R Block research finding that six in 10 people questioned whether they had got their return right after submitting it.