What is a superannuation clearing house? 2026 guide

Australian employers paid $40.4 billion in super in the March 2026 quarter alone, according to APRA. Almost none of it went straight from an employer to a fund. It went through a clearing house first, and most of the people paying it never gave that a second thought.

They're thinking about it now. The ATO's free clearing house shut its doors on 1 July 2026, the same day Payday Super kicked in. So the question isn't whether you use a clearing house anymore. It's which one, and how fast it moves.

All information in this article is accurate as of 27 August 2026. For the most up-to-date information, refer to the Australian Taxation Office.

What is a superannuation clearing house?

A superannuation clearing house is the middleman between your bank account and your employees' super funds. You send it one payment and one file. It splits that across every fund your team belongs to and sends each one its share, in the format that fund wants, with the reference numbers that fund needs.

Without one, you're doing that yourself. A 40-person team can easily be spread across 15 or 20 funds, plus a few self-managed super funds (SMSFs) with their own electronic service addresses. That's 20 separate payments, 20 separate formats, 20 chances to fat-finger a member number. Every pay run.

The clearing house also handles the plumbing. Since 2015, every employer super payment has had to travel through SuperStream, the ATO's standard for sending contribution data and money electronically. Clearing houses speak SuperStream natively, which is the main reason most employers use one. (If you're still getting your head around what superannuation is as an employer obligation, that's the place to start.)

What changed on 1 July 2026

Two things, and they're connected.

First, the Small Business Superannuation Clearing House (SBSCH) closed for good. The ATO stopped taking new registrations on 1 October 2025 and switched the service off at 11:59 pm on 30 June 2026. Send it money now and it comes straight back within seven business days, unpaid. If you were still on it for the April to June quarter, that final payment was due 28 July through some other channel.

Second, Payday Super replaced quarterly super. Contributions are now due every pay run, not every three months. The SBSCH was built for four payments a year. Asking it to do 26 or 52 wasn't going to work, so the ATO retired it.

Put those together and every Australian employer now needs a clearing house that can keep up with their payroll cycle. For most businesses, that means one built into their payroll software, not a separate portal you log into once a quarter and try to remember the password for.

Why the clearing house matters more than it used to

Under the old rules you had 28 days after each quarter. If the clearing house took a week, who cared.

Under Payday Super, your contribution only counts as on time if the fund has received it, with everything it needs to allocate it, within seven business days of payday. The word doing the work there is received. Sending it isn't enough. And the ATO says plainly that if you use a commercial clearing house, including one inside your payroll software, its processing time comes out of your seven days, not theirs.

Seven business days sounds roomy until you count them. Funds get up to three business days to allocate or reject a contribution once it lands. Weekends and public holidays don't count as business days, but they still burn calendar time. A Friday pay run, a clearing house that takes four days, and a public holiday on the Monday can leave you with about two working days of margin. That's not a buffer. That's a coin toss.

Miss the window and you're into super guarantee charge territory: the shortfall, interest, an admin fee, and extra penalties if it keeps happening. Late super is one of the payroll mistakes that's getting harder to explain away as an accident. The ATO now sees your pay dates through Single Touch Payroll and your super receipts through the funds, so it can line the two up without waiting for you to confess.

This is the bit most employers haven't fully priced in. A clearing house used to be a convenience. Now its speed is part of your compliance position.

Why use a superannuation clearing house?

You need one regardless, so it's worth being clear on what a good one does for you:

• One payment, one file, every pay run, instead of a separate transaction per fund

• SuperStream formatting handled for you, SMSF electronic service addresses included

• Fund and member details checked before money moves, so bad data gets caught before it becomes a bounced payment

• A receipt trail showing exactly when each fund got its money, which is your evidence if the ATO comes asking

• Rejections surfaced fast enough to fix and resend inside the seven-day window

That last one is where clearing houses really differ. A rejection on day two is an annoyance. A rejection you hear about on day eight is a shortfall with your name on it.

How to choose a superannuation clearing house

There are three places to get one, and the ATO keeps a list of approved options on its Super Product register:

• Built into your payroll software (Rippling, Xero, MYOB, and QuickBooks all have one), so super is calculated and sent from the same pay run

• Offered by a super fund like AustralianSuper or Rest, usually free if they're your default fund

• A standalone commercial clearing house like SuperChoice or QuickSuper, which larger employers with messy fund mixes tend to use

For most businesses, the first option wins, and the reason is boring but important: no re-keying. (If you're comparing payroll software anyway, our small business payroll software roundup covers which ones handle super natively.) The SBSCH made you calculate super in payroll, then type the same numbers into a separate portal. Every number typed twice is a number that can end up different in two places, and the ATO is now comparing what you reported through STP with what you paid.

Whichever route you take, ask four questions before you sign anything:

• What's the typical time from submission to fund receipt, and what's the worst case?

• How do rejections get reported back to you, and how quickly?

• Can you export fund-confirmed receipt timestamps for your records?

• What does it cost, per batch or per employee, and is there a minimum?

If a provider can't answer the first one with an actual number, keep walking. Under Payday Super, that number is the whole product.

Superannuation clearing house FAQs

Do employers have to pay super through a clearing house?

No law says so. What the law says is that every contribution has to travel through SuperStream and reach the fund within seven business days of payday. A clearing house is how nearly everyone meets both conditions. You could pay each fund directly every pay run instead, but you'd need a very small team and a lot of patience.

How long does it take for super to go through a clearing house?

Depends on the provider, but most quote one to four business days from a clean submission to fund receipt. Then the fund has up to three business days to allocate it. The habit worth building is submitting super on payday itself, so the full seven-day window is there to soak up delays, rejections, and the odd public holiday.

Can I still use the ATO's Small Business Superannuation Clearing House?

No. It closed on 1 July 2026 and you can't use it to pay or even download your old records. If you haven't moved to something else yet, you currently have no way to pay super, and every pay run since 1 July has been adding to a shortfall. Check your payroll software first. There's a decent chance it already has a super payment function you've never opened.

Is a super clearing house best for businesses of a certain size?

Size changes which kind suits you. It doesn't change whether you need one. A five-person business with two funds and a 200-person business with 60 funds both have to get every contribution received on time, every pay run. The small one is usually fine with whatever's built into its payroll software. The big one might want a standalone provider with more control over batching and reporting.

What happens if the clearing house is late and I miss the seven-day deadline?

You miss it. The obligation is yours, not the middleman's. The ATO has said it'll look at the circumstances, and there's a first-year soft landing for businesses making a real effort to comply, but "my clearing house was slow" isn't a defence on its own. Keep your submission confirmations and receipt records. And if a provider keeps cutting it fine, find another one.

Pay super every pay run with Rippling

The reason re-keying is risky is that payroll and super live in different systems. Rippling Payroll runs both off the same employee record. Approve a pay run and Rippling calculates super on qualifying earnings at the current 12% rate, submits STP to the ATO, and sends contributions to your employees' nominated funds via its clearing house partner. One approval, no second portal, no second set of numbers to reconcile at 4:55 pm on a Friday.

Because the data model is unified, a change to someone's fund or salary flows into the next pay run on its own. Payroll, super, and STP reporting all draw from one source, which is what keeps them matching when the ATO checks.

It also means the seven-day clock starts on a day you chose. Super leaves with the pay run, not on a separate date someone has to remember.

If you're moving off the SBSCH, or off a payroll system that still treats super as a separate chore, our guide to switching payroll providers covers what to check before you cut over. And if Payday Super has you second-guessing your super rate maths or how super works in general, start there.

See how Rippling runs super, STP, and payroll from one approval.