Error: CMN.ATO.AS.EM054 - Enter a Branch for the ABN or TFN you have provided

Hi Andrea64, 

This message usually appears where a business has multiple employing entities set up and the identical ABN is used for two or more of these entities. The ATO deems this as a duplicate lodgement and will hence cause the lodgement to fail. 

Here is a more detailed article about this error and how it can be rectified. 

https://support.yourpayroll.com.au/hc/en-au/articles/360000307336-STP-Resolving-Common-Issues

Thanks Joey but the business is does not have multiple employing entities it only has one, so your explanation cannot be the reason.  I have setup STP okay and is working.  I think the branch number relates to the Business Activity Statement.  The normal BAS has a number 001, we also lodge CAS (Consolidated Activity Statement) which as a number 002.  With other entities using Xero I had to add the 002 as the Branch number but I cannot find where you can do this in QB.  There is nothing in settings.  Please see attached screen shots., Thanks Andrea

Hi Andrea64, 

I have done further research and I could not find this particular error on ATO's table of general errors. Kindly contact our payroll experts via support@yourpayroll.com.au so this will be looked into in a timely manner. 

Please add the following details to your email: 

•        Business name and ABN & CID
•        Affected employee/s (if any)
•        Affected pay run/s (if any)
•        The username they use to access payroll (please do not send your password)
•        A screenshot of the issue or error page you are seeing, if appropriate
•        Any additional details that may assist in helping our investigations
 

This is ridiculous that it is not implemented yet, it would take a developer all of 5 minutes to add the field to the setup screen and send the extra field to the ATO's portal. 

I have 10 clients who just switched over to using an ABN Branch as of July 2024, I do not want to be manually lodging this data forever, since we use QBO for the electronic lodgement.

If this has no plans to be implemented, it should be listed as a missing feature and leaving feedback doesn't help.

I have spoken to support who said they'll "take note" which doesn't fill me with confidence. We may need to look at Recon or Xero or MYOB, if they can do something so basic, we may take all 20 of our clients over there.