Community Guidelines

Community is where the tax profession meets to connect and grow.

It’s where members of The Tax Institute can engage with each other in a closed environment to debate, collaborate, share knowledge and communicate on the topics that matter to them. This is where leading tax thought is inspired, discussed, and shared.

It’s also a space for members to meet, find common ground, create new links and build relationships within our tax community.

Community Guidelines for Participation

These community guidelines are in place to assist you in understanding what is expected of you and what to expect from others in this space.  Their purpose is to outline acceptable behaviours and rules with regard to posting content.

We are committed to ensuring our actions align with the mission and purpose of this community platform.  Moderators, who are staff of The Tax Institute, will ensure that members’ posts and comments are relevant and appropriate.  We will take any steps we deem necessary to ensure that community conversations meet the guidelines described below and that Community is a safe and respectful place for all involved. 

We encourage member engagement and value the views and insights of our members. Your contributions as part of this platform can assist in identifying issues for escalation to the regulators and other external stakeholders. This allows The Tax Institute and Community to support you.
As a profession, we are stronger when we act together, for each other. To maintain a welcoming environment for all users, your participation in Community must always be respectful of others.
Community is a place for us to grow together, help each other and explore a range of tax topics. Whether you’re asking questions or giving answers, be free with your ‘likes’, ‘thank yous’, ‘good jobs’ and kudos.
More than anything, Community exists to be an interactive and ever-growing resource for you as a tax professional. Use it to help grow your understanding of tax in a collaborative, professional environment.
Everyone can benefit from the input of an experienced colleague, another pair of eyes, or a new perspective. To satisfy your own needs for knowledge or to propel a conversation further, this is a space to pose questions, big and small.
Think you know the answer to a peer’s question? Don’t be shy, share your experience and insight.
Links to thought leadership articles, resources, or relevant social media posts outside of this forum are permitted within reason but limited to one post. Be sure to fully disclose your sources when posting content of this nature.
Keep it relevant. The content you share should be relevant to this forum and based on your own honest opinions and experience. For Community discussions focused on a specific topic, you should only submit content related to that topic. Conversations and discussions may address a variety of topics, but if you make a post that is off topic it might be removed in order to keep discussions on track.
We encourage you to celebrate your successes or good news stories, however selling, spam, shameless self-promotion, irrelevant promotional links, and promotion for profit are not permitted.
Although it is an online meeting place, Community is not a group of faceless voices. You are all part of the same profession where you can build new connections and co-create solutions to challenges. Remember that you are not anonymous here – your Community profile is a reflection of your professional practice and your membership of The Tax Institute.
Community is a safe place to grow, collaborate and learn. The behaviours outlined below are not acceptable on this forum and may result in content removal or privileges of the Community account being removed.
Contributors may NOT make posts or comments that are:
  • Threatening, abusive, bullying, defamatory or contain offensive language or references or personal attacks against other forum participants, including staff and moderators.
  • Inflammatory, unconstructive or at odds with the aims of the community.
  • Unsolicited messages (including ‘spam’).
  • Promotional in nature or an attempt to solicit their own business.
  • Requests for private information from members such as email addresses or other contact information.
  • Unconstructive messages about The Tax Institute and any of its products or services.
  • Irrelevant or off topic subject matter.
  • The same message in multiple threads or forums.
  • Links to third party websites that have no bearing or relevance to members of the community.
You and your peers are leading the discussion here. We will respond if a question is not able to be answered by the community, but only when a discussion or problem remains unresolved after a certain period.
Community will be monitored by technical experts and moderators so that you can be sure there is an authoritative response available if required and you will be connected to the appropriate contact when necessary.
Give people time to consider your question or discussion. You may not receive an instant response. If an issue is complex it may take time to resolve.
We want the community to consider and discuss issues between them before we look to step in, so you may not receive a speedy response from us. If we do weigh-in, our moderators will seek advice and may share links to resources that may assist in resolving a question, but we will be focusing on accuracy, not necessarily speed.
Community is not a binding advice service of The Tax Institute. It is a forum for our members to drive conversations and resolve issues together and primarily a collection of opinions and thoughts of our members. Be careful not to post financial advice. You must be registered with a registered body to do that. If in doubt, keep it general.
If our moderators feel the discussion has come to an end, or has been resolved, we may recommend an answer by adding a ‘Recommended’ badge to the thread. This tells the user that we feel the answer offers clarity and is an accurate answer to a question.
Threads that are no longer being discussed will be archived.

Content Moderation Goals and Policy

This is a place focused on collaborative growth and support.  By being a closed community to members you can assume that you are sharing in a safe, respectful, and informed environment. 

By participating in this forum, we request that you observe our Community Guidelines.
We want to encourage a safe community that ensures the dialogue remains relevant and engaging for all members.
We don’t want to police, censor or remove content from Community. However, we do need to ensure it is a safe and positive space for all participants.
The moderators apply the following simple principles when reviewing content across Community:
  • We believe debate and disagreement are constructive but personal attacks, trolling, and abuse will not be tolerated. The key to a great Community experience is an engaging and inclusive space where everyone can learn and grow. Be nice!
  • We accept criticism of our own products, services, policies, and performance, however in the spirit of constructive debate summarised above we will distinguish between useful focused argument and negative unhelpful comments about The Tax Institute or any other company or product.
  • We understand people may feel strongly about issues discussed in Community, but we will remove any post or comment that others might find offensive or threatening. Please consider the impact your posts may have on others and think twice before you post! If you would not say it in person, don’t say it online.
  • We reserve the right to redirect conversation or remove the ability to comment on posts that become a series of negative, unconstructive comments based on personal opinions or generalisations. We don’t want to stop you from discussing issues you are passionate about, but we do ask members to find ways of sharing their views that do not feel alienating, threatening, or toxic to other members.
  • Community is not an extension of The Tax Institute’s customer service team. Please direct queries, requests or feedback via the ‘contact us’ page on this community platform or via The Tax Institute’s website.
  • This is a group of your peers, not your prospective leads or clients. We take a strong stance against promotion, lead generation and soliciting. Please do not offer your content or services unless a member personally asks you. If a member in private message solicits you without establishing a prior relationship, please let us know at [email address] so we can look into the issue.
  • The Community platform is moderated by The Tax Institute, but the conversation belongs to everyone that participates in it. We want Community to be a welcome place for intelligent discussion and support, and we ask members to help us achieve this by notifying us of potential problems and helping each other to keep conversations appropriate. If you spot something problematic within the community, please report the post or contact us at community@taxinstitute.com.au
Community moderators reserve the right to delete or turn off posts, with or without notification.
You may be asked to edit your post or comment due to reasons of clarity, promotional content, offensive content, or unlawful or threatening content.
Depending on the severity and frequency of any offending content, you may not be notified that your post or comment has been removed. If the moderators of the community or The Tax Institute feel an issue needs to be addressed, we will notify you privately.
We value diverse opinions, so you may disagree with some content that you read on this platform. Keep in mind that something that may be disagreeable to you may not violate our guidelines. If you feel a comment or post does contravene these guidelines, you can report it as inappropriate. The moderators will be notified and investigate the post or discussion thread.
Community moderators operate on giving the benefit of the doubt. Three warnings for behaviour that goes against these guidelines will result in removal from the group for a period of 30 days.
After the 30-day period, you are welcome to rejoin the group on a 30-day probationary period. If you act against the Community Guidelines again during your probation, you will be permanently removed from Community.

Conditions of Use

The Tax Institute community forum (‘the Community’) is subject to The Tax Institute’s (TTI) Conditions of Use (COU) which you agree to by accessing this site. Our standard COU can be accessed at: https://www.taxinstitute.com.au/footer/conditions-of-us If you do not accept our COU, you must refrain from using the Community. Our COU may be amended without notice to you. You must regularly review the latest version of the COU as it will be the terms upon which you access the Community at all times. The following terms also supplement our COU and apply to your use of the Community:
  • By agreeing to the Conditions of Use, you agree to be subject to the Community Guidelines.
  • In accessing and contributing to the Community, remember that you are required to comply with the Code of Professional Conduct which can be accessed here.
  • The Community presents information provided by registered users. We make no representations as to the accuracy of the information presented that has not expressly originated from and been recommended by The Tax Institute. For the avoidance of doubt, TTI recommended content will be clearly identifiable by all users.
  • By using the Community, you agree to bear all risks associated with the use of any information, including any reliance on the accuracy, completeness, or usefulness of such information.
  • We do not pre-screen or regularly review posts, but we have the absolute right (though not the obligation) to modify and/or remove, without notice, any content published.
  • The Community will send you emails providing you with information about conversations in which you have participated or conversations and websites in which you might be interested based on your past site activities. By agreeing to the COU, you consent to receive these emails though this does not affect your ability to opt out of receiving emails by amending your notification settings in your profile. activating the 'opt out' option included in each email.
The terms of The Tax Institute’s Privacy, Copyright any Disclaimer policy apply to the Community and by using the Community you agree to be bound by these terms and conditions. The full terms of The Tax Institute’s policy can be accessed here.
If you do not accept these terms and conditions, you must refrain from using the Community. In addition to the terms of our Privacy, Copyright and Disclaimer policy, we note the following:
  • The Community presents information provided by registered users. We make no representations as to the accuracy of the information presented that has not expressly originated from and been recommended by The Tax Institute. For the avoidance of doubt, The Tax Institute recommended content will be clearly identifiable by all users of the Community. By using the Community, you agree to bear all risks associated with the use of any information, including any reliance on the accuracy, completeness, or usefulness of such information.
  • Information provided on this website may be in the form of summaries and generalisations, may not apply to this financial year, and may omit detail that could be significant in a particular context.
  • When we recommend content, we are committed to providing you with accurate, consistent and clear information to help you with your tax questions.
  • If you feel that the information on this site does not fully cover address your questions or matters raised by you, you may ask further questions.
The Tax Institute does not accept any liability for any failure to comply with the Conditions of Use where such failure is due to circumstances beyond our reasonable control.
If we waive any rights available to us under these Conditions of Use on one occasion, this does not mean that those rights will automatically be waived on any other occasion.
If any of the Conditions of Use are held to be invalid, unenforceable or illegal for any reason, the remaining terms and conditions shall nevertheless continue in full force.
These Conditions of Use are governed by the laws in force in New South Wales. You agree to submit to the exclusive jurisdiction of the courts of that jurisdiction.