Superannuation
Concessional Contributions
Pre-tax super contributions, including employer SG and salary sacrifice, taxed at a concessional rate of 15% within the fund rather than at your marginal tax rate.
Types of concessional contributions
- Superannuation Guarantee (SG) - compulsory employer contributions, currently 12% of your qualifying earnings.
- Salary sacrifice - an arrangement to direct part of your pre-tax salary into super instead of taking it as cash.
- Personal deductible contributions - contributions you make yourself and then claim as a tax deduction (common for the self-employed, or anyone topping up beyond their employer's SG).
The cap
The annual concessional contributions cap is $32,500 (from 1 July 2026). Contributions above this cap don't get the concessional 15% rate - instead, the excess becomes an Excess Concessional Contribution (ECC), added to your assessable income and taxed at your marginal rate, with a 15% offset to account for the contributions tax already paid inside the fund. If the ECC isn't withdrawn from your super fund, it's then treated as a non-concessional contribution and counts towards your Non-Concessional Contributions cap as well - so a single excess amount can end up assessed under both caps if left in place. If you have unused cap space from the past five years, you may be able to contribute more than the standard cap in a single year - see Concessional Carry Forward.
Division 293 - the catch for high income earners
If your income plus your concessional contributions together exceed $250,000 in a financial year, you pay an extra 15% on the portion of contributions that pushed you over that threshold - bringing the effective tax rate on those contributions to 30% instead of 15%. That's still lower than the 47% top marginal rate (including the Medicare levy). Worth noting: this $250,000 threshold hasn't moved since 2017 and isn't indexed, so more people cross it each year purely through wage growth. See Division 293 Tax for more.
Related terms
See it in your plan
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