What to Give Your Accountant at Tax Time

Published 13 June 2026 · About a 4 minute read

A good accountant is fast and accurate when you hand them organised records, and slow and expensive when you hand them a shoebox. The good news: getting organised is mostly about collecting a short list of things and sorting your expenses once. Here is exactly what to bring.

The short checklist

Your income statement. The PAYG income statement from your employer (it appears in myGov once finalised). Add any other income: interest, dividends, side hustle, rental.
Work-related expenses, sorted. A categorised list of what you spent for work across the year, not a pile of loose receipts. More on this below.
The receipts behind them. Keep the actual receipts or invoices as backup. The ATO expects them as the primary record, kept for five years.
A car logbook if you claim vehicle expenses, and work-from-home hours if you work from home.
Last year's return if you are with a new accountant, plus your bank details for any refund.

The part people get wrong: the expenses

Income documents are easy. They are mostly in myGov. The part that eats time (yours and your accountant's) is the work-related spending. Handing over a year of receipts in a bag means your accountant either charges you to sort them or asks you to do it anyway. What they actually want is a single summary, grouped by category, with a total for each.

Sorting a year of spending by hand is the tedious bit. Snap receipts as you go and import a bank statement for the rest, and the categorising is done for you, then you export one clean file.

CSV or PDF for the accountant?

Ask what they prefer. A PDF summary is easy to read and good for a face-to-face appointment. A CSV drops straight into their software. It is worth sending both: the PDF for them to skim, the CSV for them to import.

Hand over one clean file, not a shoebox

Recpt sorts your receipts and bank-statement transactions into ATO categories through the year. At tax time you export a tidy summary (PDF for your accountant to read, CSV for their software) grouped by category with totals. Free to start. No card needed.

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What the Recpt export includes

Every confirmed expense with its date, vendor, amount and ATO category.
Totals per category, so the work-related picture is clear at a glance.
The work-use split where it applies (for example part-work, part-personal items).
Two formats (a PDF report and a CSV) for whichever your accountant prefers.

A few things that speed up the appointment

Sort as you go, not in October. Capturing through the year means tax time is a review, not a reconstruction.
Keep the receipts. A summary tells the story; the receipts are the evidence behind it.
Flag anything unusual. A big one-off purchase or a tricky expense is worth a quick note so your accountant can ask the right question.

Keep reading

This article is general information about record keeping, not tax advice. Recpt is a record-keeping tool, not a registered tax agent. Always check current ATO guidance at ato.gov.au and consult a registered tax agent before lodging.