ATO Rate Scraping Skill

Extracts current tax rates, thresholds, and benchmarks from official Australian government sources. Uses Jina AI Reader API to convert ATO web pages into structured rate data with full provenance tracking.

When to Use

• Validating that cached tax rates match current ATO publications
• Detecting quarterly fuel tax credit rate changes
• Confirming annual rate updates (Div 7A benchmark, SG rate, FBT rates)
• Verifying IAWO threshold after federal budget announcements
• Populating rate tables for new financial years
• Cross-checking rate fallback values in analysis engines

Scraping Method

Use the Jina AI Reader API to fetch and parse ATO pages:

curl "https://r.jina.ai/https://www.ato.gov.au/[rate-page-path]" \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer $JINA_API_KEY"

The Jina Reader converts pages to clean markdown, stripping navigation and ads. Rate tables are preserved as markdown tables for structured extraction.

Rate Source Registry

Primary Sources

Rate	Source URL	Update Schedule	Extraction Pattern
Individual Tax Brackets	ato.gov.au/tax-rates-and-codes/tax-rates-australian-residents	Annual (1 Jul)	Table: Taxable income / Tax on this income
Corporate Tax Rate	ato.gov.au/businesses-and-organisations/income-deductions-and-concessions/income-tax-rate	Annual (Budget)	Paragraph: "The full company tax rate is..."
Division 7A Benchmark	ATO Tax Determinations (annual)	Annual (before 1 Jul)	TD title: "Income tax: Division 7A benchmark interest rate"
Fuel Tax Credits	ato.gov.au/businesses-and-organisations/income-deductions-and-concessions/incentives-and-concessions/fuel-schemes/fuel-tax-credits-business/rates-all-fuels	Quarterly	Table: Fuel type / Rate per litre / Period
SG Rate	ato.gov.au/businesses-and-organisations/super-for-employers/how-much-to-pay	Annual (legislated)	Table: Period / SG rate percentage
FBT Rate & Gross-Up	ato.gov.au/businesses-and-organisations/fringe-benefits-tax	Annual (1 Apr)	Table: FBT year / Rate / Type 1 / Type 2
IAWO Threshold	ato.gov.au/businesses-and-organisations/income-deductions-and-concessions/depreciation-and-capital-expenses-and-allowances/simpler-depreciation-for-small-business	Budget announcement	Paragraph: "instant asset write-off threshold"
Medicare Levy	ato.gov.au/individuals-and-families/medicare-and-private-health-insurance/medicare-levy	Annual (Budget)	Paragraph: "Medicare levy is..."

Secondary Sources

Rate	Source
R&D Tax Offset Rates	business.gov.au/grants-and-programs/research-and-development-tax-incentive
Payroll Tax Thresholds	State revenue office websites (per-state)
CGT Discount	ato.gov.au/individuals-and-families/investments-and-assets/capital-gains-tax/cgt-discount

Extraction Process

1. Fetch page via Jina AI Reader API
2. Locate rate table by searching for known headers (e.g., "Taxable income", "Rate per litre")
3. Parse markdown table into structured key-value pairs
4. Validate extracted values against expected ranges:
   • Tax rates: 0-100%
   • Dollar thresholds: > 0
   • Interest rates: 0-20%
   • Fuel credit rates: $0.00-$1.00 per litre
5. Compare against cached values in lib/tax-data/cache-manager.ts
6. Record provenance: source URL, extraction timestamp, financial year, effective date

Validation Rules

Rate Type	Expected Range	Red Flag If
Corporate Tax Rate	25-30%	< 20% or > 35%
R&D Offset	35-50%	< 30% or > 55%
Div 7A Benchmark	4-12%	< 2% or > 15%
SG Rate	9-15%	< 9% or > 15%
FBT Rate	45-50%	< 40% or > 55%
Fuel Credit (per litre)	$0.05-$0.80	< $0.01 or > $1.00
IAWO Threshold	$1,000-$200,000	< $1,000 or > $500,000
Medicare Levy	1-3%	< 1% or > 5%

Values outside expected ranges should be flagged for manual verification before cache update.

Output Format

<rate_scrape_result>
  <source_url>https://www.ato.gov.au/businesses-and-organisations/super-for-employers/how-much-to-pay</source_url>
  <scraped_at>2026-02-13T10:30:00+11:00</scraped_at>
  <scrape_method>jina_ai_reader</scrape_method>
  <rates_extracted>
    <rate>
      <name>Superannuation Guarantee Rate</name>
      <value>0.12</value>
      <display_value>12%</display_value>
      <effective_from>2025-07-01</effective_from>
      <effective_to>2026-06-30</effective_to>
      <financial_year>FY2025-26</financial_year>
      <legislation>SGAA 1992, s 19</legislation>
      <confidence>high</confidence>
    </rate>
  </rates_extracted>
  <validation>
    <in_expected_range>true</in_expected_range>
    <changed_from_cache>true</changed_from_cache>
    <previous_cached_value>0.115</previous_cached_value>
  </validation>
</rate_scrape_result>

Best Practices

• Always verify extracted rates against expected ranges before updating cache
• Never auto-update rates that fall outside expected ranges — flag for manual review
• Log every scrape with full provenance for audit trail (AD-5)
• Respect rate limits on ATO.gov.au — maximum 1 request per 10 seconds
• Cache Jina responses for 15 minutes to avoid redundant scrapes
• FY attribution is mandatory — every rate must specify which financial year it applies to
• Fallback values must remain in engine code for resilience — scraping augments, not replaces