Tax Agent Services Act 2009 – Sect 30.10 The Code of Professional Conduct

Honesty and integrity

1. You must act honestly and with integrity.
2. You must comply with the taxation laws in the conduct of your personal affairs.
3. If:
   1. you receive money or other property from or on behalf of a client; and
   2. you hold the money or other property on trust;
   you must account to your client for the money or other property.

Independence

4. You must act lawfully in the best interests of your client.
5. You must have in place adequate arrangements for the management of conflicts of interest that may arise in relation to the activities that you undertake in the capacity of a registered tax agent or BAS agent.

Confidentiality

6. Unless you have a legal duty to do so, you must not disclose any information relating to a client's affairs to a third party without your client's permission.

Competence

7. You must ensure that a tax agent service that you provide, or that is provided on your behalf, is provided competently.
8. You must maintain knowledge and skills relevant to the tax agent services that you provide.
9. You must take reasonable care in ascertaining a client's state of affairs, to the extent that ascertaining the state of those affairs is relevant to a statement you are making or a thing you are doing on behalf of the client.
10. You must take reasonable care to ensure that taxation laws are applied correctly to the circumstances in relation to which you are providing advice to a client.

Other responsibilities

11. You must not knowingly obstruct the proper administration of the taxation laws.
12. You must advise your client of the client's rights and obligations under the taxation laws that are materially related to the tax agent services you provide.
13. You must maintain professional indemnity insurance that meets the Board's requirements.
14. You must respond to requests and directions from the Board in a timely, responsible and reasonable manner.
15. You must not employ, or use the services of, an entity to provide tax agent services on your behalf if:
    1. you know, or ought reasonably to know, that the entity is a disqualified entity; and
    2. the Board has not given you approval under section 45-5 to employ, or use the services of, the disqualified entity to provide tax agent services on your behalf.
16. You must not provide tax agent services in connection with an arrangement with an entity that you know, or ought reasonably to know, is a disqualified entity.
17. You must comply with any obligations determined under section 30-12.