A DPN, a statutory demand, a wind-up threat from the ATO — whatever landed on your desk, it comes with a clock. We help you deal with the tax debt in front of you — and then fix the business that created it, so you're not back here in two years.
Book an urgent callThe ATO is making you personally liable for the company's unpaid PAYG, GST or super. From the date on the notice — not the day you opened it — you have 21 days before they can come after you personally.
What you do in those 21 days decides whether this stays a company problem.
A creditor — often the ATO — is formally demanding payment. Ignore it and your company is presumed insolvent, which is the short road to a wind-up application you can't argue with.
This is the one letter you never leave in the drawer.
Whether it's a court date to wind the company up or an ATO letter demanding payment of a mounting debt, the options narrow every week you wait. Directors who act early keep choices. Directors who wait get outcomes.
The earlier the conversation, the more of the business — and your position — we can protect.
Here's how the usual turnaround goes. The tax debt gets restructured or wiped. The creditors get dealt with. Fresh paint, clean balance sheet, a ship that looks brand new — handed back to the same captain who sank it the first time. And it doesn't matter how good that ship is. That captain will crash it again.
We've restructured a lot of businesses over the years — put in new systems, new automations, had it all running beautifully — and watched owners take the wheel and steer straight back onto the rocks. Because the debt was never the core problem. The core problem is almost always the way the owner thinks and runs the business. Painting the ship without changing the captain isn't a turnaround. It's a delay.
So yes — we'll help you deal with the DPN, the ATO debt, the wind-up threat, through the options that actually exist: payment arrangements, small business restructuring, voluntary administration, a deed of company arrangement where that's the right call. What we're not interested in is getting rid of the tax debt and waving goodbye. We work with you long term to change how the business runs — and how you run it — so you don't crash the ship again.
Your real options, laid out straight: ATO payment arrangements, small business restructuring, voluntary administration, a DOCA. Where a formal appointment is required, we work alongside registered insolvency practitioners — and we tell you honestly which path fits, including when the honest answer is that the company can't be saved — and you still can.
Tax debt is a symptom. We find what actually created it — pricing, cash-flow discipline, systems that exist only in your head, decisions that never get made — and rebuild the business so it generates the cash to stay ahead of the ATO instead of behind it.
This is the part most turnaround firms skip, and it's the part that decides everything. We work with you on how you think, decide and lead — because a restructured business handed back to unchanged habits is just the same sinking ship with fresh paint.
We stay past the crisis. Through the restructure, into the rebuild, and long enough that the new way of running the business holds without us in the room. That's what "turnaround" actually means.
You tell us what's arrived and when. We tell you straight what it means, what the deadlines are, and what your options look like — before you spend a dollar.
We map the real numbers, deal with the ATO and creditors, and put the right formal or informal path in motion — inside the deadlines that protect you personally.
Payment arrangement, voluntary administration, a DOCA or small business restructuring — whatever genuinely fits, not whatever's easiest to sell — executed properly, with registered practitioners where the law requires them.
Then the real turnaround: systems, cash discipline, and the way the business is led — rebuilt with you, measured, and made to hold so the ship doesn't sink twice.
Solar businesses cop a particular kind of tax trouble. STC and rebate income that's GST-able when you didn't plan for it. Rebate clawbacks that hit cash flow months after the job's done. Boom-and-bust quarters where the BAS keeps growing while the installs slow down. We've worked inside the solar industry for years — you won't be explaining how an STC works to us first.
If your solar company has a Director Penalty Notice, a growing ATO debt, or a wind-up threat sitting on the desk, the same rule applies: deal with the debt properly, then fix the cash-flow and quoting systems that let it build up — or you'll be painting the same sinking ship next year.
What it means, lockdown vs non-lockdown, and your options inside the window.
The creditor deal that lets a company survive administration — and the catch nobody mentions.
When it works — and when administration or liquidation is the safer call.
Why clearing the debt is only half the turnaround — from someone who's sat in the chair.
It's the ATO making you personally liable for the company's unpaid PAYG withholding, GST or superannuation guarantee. It's not a warning letter — it's the legal mechanism that moves the debt from the company to you. If one has arrived, the 21-day clock is already running from the date on the notice.
21 days from the date of the notice — not the day it arrived in your letterbox. For a non-lockdown DPN, acting within those 21 days — paying the debt, or appointing an administrator, restructuring practitioner or liquidator — can remit your personal liability. Miss the window and the penalty stands.
A non-lockdown DPN applies where the company reported its obligations on time and then didn't pay — and you have options within the 21 days. A lockdown DPN applies where the company didn't report on time — and with those, paying in full is the only way out of personal liability. Which one you're holding changes everything, so it's the first thing we check.
A DOCA is a deal, voted on by creditors, that lets a company in voluntary administration survive — usually by paying creditors an agreed amount, often less than the full debt, over time, instead of being liquidated. Done well, it clears the decks. Done as a standalone fix with nothing else changed, it's fresh paint on a sinking ship.
A streamlined formal process for companies with liabilities under $1 million. You stay in control of the business while a restructuring practitioner helps put a plan to creditors. Entered inside the 21-day window, it can also remit a non-lockdown DPN.
Our honest view: it's not the right tool for every company, and we don't recommend it by default. The process carries real risks, and for some directors voluntary administration — or an orderly liquidation and a genuine fresh start — is the safer, cleaner path. Which call is right depends on your numbers, and that judgement is exactly what the first conversation is for.
More often than directors expect, yes — if the underlying business is viable and you act before the options run out. What we won't do is tell you a business can be saved when it can't, or "save" it by clearing the debt and handing you back the same machine that created the problem. The honest conversation comes first, and it costs you nothing.
One confidential conversation about what's arrived, what it means, and what your real options are — before the deadlines make the decision for you. No obligation, no judgement, and no paint jobs on sinking ships.