Is the ATO Grave Robbing Now?

Something rarely shocks me after years of dealing with the Australian Tax Office (ATO), but this was beyond callous. When the husband of a woman tragically killed in a car accident showed me a Director Penalty Notice (DPN) he received as the executor of her estate, my reaction was one of disbelief—followed by sheer disgust.

This grieving husband, my client, is now raising their two sons alone after losing his wife in a senseless accident. She was hit head-on by a driver who was high and utterly reckless.

Since then, he’s done all he can to keep going, picking up the pieces of his life while holding his family together. And now, while he’s still trying to process this unimaginable loss, the ATO decides to come knocking—coldly and heartlessly.

The timing? Horrific. Truly sickening.

The ATO had sat on this issue so long that his wife’s company was deregistered.

Now, as executor of her estate, he has been saddled with a DPN that forces him to jump through endless hoops and pour tens of thousands of dollars into reopening a company he now needs to reregister just so he can close it properly.

He’s looking at $20,000 just to reregister the company and another $10,000 to $15,000 to liquidate it and resolve this mess—money he simply doesn’t have.

This isn’t just insensitivity; it’s malice, pure and simple.

The ATO waited until the company was deregistered, striking at the exact moment it would inflict the most pain. There’s no excuse for it. Yes, the ATO has statutory powers that allow them to issue these notices, but using them in this way goes beyond mere bureaucracy. It’s cynical, almost vindictive.

Meanwhile, the ATO is cutting deals in the millions through Small Business Restructures (SBRs), letting companies clear debts for pennies on the dollar, often just to tidy up their books. In the wake of COVID and under the relentless pressure of government-imposed taxes, countless businesses have been squeezed to the breaking point.

The ATO’s tactics here reveal a double standard—on the one hand, they're eagerly restructuring debts to settle accounts, while on the other, they’re reaching into the grave for more.

My client now has to go cap in hand to his elderly parents, asking for a loan simply to put his wife’s company to rest—an additional burden in the wake of tragedy. It’s an unconscionable act, forcing a family already torn by grief to endure even more suffering just to satisfy a relentless, heartless bureaucracy. The ATO is meant to uphold the law, not weaponize it against the dead.