How to track salary, side income and investments in one view

Plenty of Australians now earn from more than one place: a salary, some freelance or contract work on the side, and returns from investments. Each source arrives on a different schedule, in a different account, with different tax treatment. This guide shows a simple way to bring them into one view, what the ATO says about the main types of income, and a worked example.

It is general information only. It is not tax or financial advice, and it does not take your personal circumstances into account.

Why is it hard to see several income sources at once?

Because they do not line up. Salary arrives on a regular pay cycle. Side income may be irregular, may be paid in lumps and may be paid before or after you have done the work. Investment income, such as dividends or interest, comes on the issuer’s schedule. If each lives in a different account or app, no single place shows the total, and it is easy to miss one when you plan or lodge a tax return.

What does the ATO say about each type of income?

The ATO’s income you must declare page groups income by type. The three most relevant here are:

• Employment income. The ATO says the most common type of employment income is salary and wages, whether you have one job or more, and whether you work full time, part time or casual. It lists commissions and bonuses among the payments to declare.
• Business income, including a side hustle. The ATO says that if you are a sole trader you must declare the income you earn from your business in your individual tax return, and that if you have a side hustle, you may need to work out whether you are in business. It adds that you do not need to lodge a separate tax return for your business.
• Investment income. The ATO lists interest, dividends, rental income and capital gains as examples of investment income to work out whether you must declare. It also has pages on shares, exchange traded funds and managed investment trusts.

The ATO page on business income also says that if you run a business as a sole trader and earn salary or wages as well, your total taxable income is your total assessable business income plus your total assessable employment income. It notes that this total may affect repayments on income contingent loans like FEE-HELP, and offset eligibility and amounts. That is one reason a combined view of your income is useful.

Whether your side income is a business, and how it is taxed, depends on your facts. The ATO’s pages and a registered tax agent are the places to settle that.

How do you set up a single view?

Keep it simple. A structure that works for most people has four parts.

1. One line per source. For example: salary from employer, freelance work, dividends, interest, rent. Give each a stable name so month-to-month comparisons work.
2. Record the amount received and the date. Use what actually landed in the account, because that is what your bank statement shows and what you can reconcile.
3. Note the gross amount where you can. Tax may already have been withheld from salary, but not from side income or investment returns. Seeing both amounts helps you avoid treating all of a payment as spendable.
4. Total them in one place. A single monthly total, with the source lines underneath, shows your overall income and its mix.

Moneysmart suggests using your bank’s app, a simple spreadsheet or its budget planner to track your progress, and the same idea applies here: choose one place and keep using it.

What does it look like in practice?

In this fictional example, Priya has a salary, takes on occasional freelance work and holds some shares. The numbers are made up and rounded.

Source	How it arrives	Received this month
Salary (after tax)	Fortnightly into the everyday account	$5,200
Freelance project	One invoice paid into a separate account	$1,500
Share dividends	Twice a year, into a savings account	$0 this month ($600 last month)
Savings interest	Monthly	$40
Total received		$6,740

Reading the table, Priya sees three things a single account would hide. Freelance work was 22% of what came in this month (1,500 divided by 6,740), dividends are lumpy, and only the salary figure is shown after tax. That last point matters because the freelance and dividend amounts may not be what Priya can spend once tax is considered. Priya leaves the question of what tax applies to the ATO’s guidance or a registered tax agent, and tracks the received amounts in the meantime.

How do you track investments alongside income?

Treat investment returns as income when they are paid, and treat the investments themselves as assets. The two are different things:

• Income from investments (dividends, interest, rent) is money you receive. It belongs on your income lines.
• The value of the investments (shares, funds, property) is an asset. It belongs in your net worth, which is a snapshot rather than a flow. Our guide to working out your net worth covers how to value each type.

Keeping them apart stops you counting a rise in share prices as income, or a dividend as a change in net worth that has already been counted.

How can you keep this up without it taking over your weekend?

Pull the data from where it already lives. Your bank statements show salary, invoice payments and interest, so importing them each month and sorting the transactions by source does most of the work. Finsplore does this for statements you import today: it reads the files you download from your bank, sorts the transactions into categories and shows accounts, spending and net worth together. Direct bank connections through open banking are coming soon.

Whichever tool you use, a monthly review of 15 to 20 minutes is usually enough. Check that each source appears, note anything missing and update your totals.

What are the limits of this approach?

A combined view shows what came in. It does not tell you what you owe in tax, what to save or how to invest. Those depend on your circumstances, so use the ATO’s pages, a registered tax agent or a licensed financial adviser for them. The structure above is a bookkeeping habit, not advice.