ATO emulates ignorance when it comes to the Mac

Sam Varghese
Tuesday, 01 September 2009 17:18

Opinion and Analysis

Here is one of the "relavant facts" in the ruling I received today: "You do not believe that the Tax Office recommended emulation softare works on new Intel processors to enable Macintosh users to download e-tax." Huh?

Let's skip over the obvious ignorance. Even if one had an old Mac and did install Virtual PC 7 as instructed by the ATO, surely it should be obvious that one has then to purchase a copy of Windows and install it in order to install the e-tax application?

Here's another gem from the ruling: "You believe that you will need to purchase the Windows operating system to enable you to use e-tax on one of your computers."

A note to Keira Torrisi, who was responsible for the ruling (which has taken all of six weeks - must have been some deep thinking going on), and Braddon Ross, the authorising officer - the requirement to have Windows has been set by your employer who decided that only Windows software would be made available. I have nothing to do with it.

The ruling itself said that one is not entitled to a deduction if one purchases Windows to file one's taxes. Question 2, which the ATO framed, was interesting: "Are you responsible for the decline in the value of the Windows operating system?" The answer was Yes.

I'm afraid I cannot take credit for all the bad karma Windows has accumulated - worms, scumware, malware, spyware, absymally bad security and inflated prices would beat me hands down when it comes to "the decline in value of the Windows operating system". Oh, and Steve Ballmer probably has something to do with it, as well.

I'm mentally gearing up to wade through the 100-odd pages of the tax book, with a black ballpoint pen in hand. I believe a blue pen is acceptable as well. Wish me luck.