There are 7 threads of conversation in this summary

Threads continued from previous summaries, out of a possible 13
6. Jokes
13. OTT ASX announcement: Equity Capital Raising

There are five new threads.
14. Circular to Employees/Ex Employees
15. Sallie, not Sally
16. Tax Rates
17. Years Service calculation
18. Superannuation issues


Thread: 6
Subject: Jokes

Email footers (from Nick & Ben).
-----
The Melbourne Cup: the race that stops two nations. However, some
media commentators forget that New Zealand exists.
-----
Problem: My alarm clock is not alert
-----
Kill Bill - sounds like a good movie for a Windows Hater.
-----
What's the difference between Elvis and Christopher Skase?
Elvis's death was not an accounting trick
-----
What's the similarity between Elvis and Skase?
They've both been seen alive last month in Bondi.
-----
Proposed addition to the PDP-11 instruction set
POPI Punch Operator Immediately
-----
Doh A Beer.
(Parody of "Doh A Deer" from "The Sound Of Music")
A song by Homer Simpson

DOH... the stuff...that buys me beer...
RAY... the guy that sells me beer...
ME...the guy...who drinks the beer,
FAR...a long way to get a beer...
SO...I'll have another beer...
LA...ger is a form of beer...
TEA...no thanks, I'm drinking beer...
That will bring us back to...
DOH!!! DOH!!! DOH!!! DOH!!! DOOOOH!!! SO DOH!!!
-oOo-

Other funnies ...
-----
Don't hold your breath or
you'll turn blue, die, be buried, rot, be reincarnated as an insolvency
accountant, then live to the age of 57 before being murdered by a
dissatisfied employee still waiting for a brass razoo.
-- Tom Northey
[True: You cannot kill yourself by holding your breath - from MX ]
-----
Don't
let 'em get away with a penny! (or, at least, a penny more than they
already are)
-- Elizabeth Fullerton
-----
[Taxi fares come] from the other fund which (at
this rate) will be fully dealt with when the Earth is demolished for
an intergalactic bypass in 2 million years time.
-- Nick Bishop
-----
It was definitely written down as otherwise DTT wouldn't agree to
it. :-)
-- Glenn Shirley

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Thread: 13
Subject: OTT ASX announcement: Equity Capital Raising

Date: Thu, 30 Oct 2003 11:29:05 +1100
From: Michael Williams <mikews@o...>
Subject: Re: OT shareholder meeting

Guys,

I have been advised there will be an OT shareholder meeting on 21/11/03
at 11am at the Harbourview hotel in Sydney. This is in relation to
raising 1billion shares at 1c each ($10m) I note in the paperwork that
if this is successful then $2.9m will be used to pay off deferred
liabilities, and a further $1.8m to pay off libilities owing under the
DOCA.

==========

Date: Thu, 23 Oct 2003 13:29:32 +1000
From: Tom Northey <tn@d...>
Subject: Re: Circular To Employees/Ex Employees

"Mike Williams" wrote
> I would be very
> interested to know if they are paying Paterson Ord Minnett for their
services?

Paterson Ord Minnett are getting $900K

If you have not seen the latest ASX announcement from OTT, they are
asking
shareholders for approval to issue up to 1 billion shares at 1c each
and 333
million options with exercise price of 1.5c (options presumably issued
for
no cost). Shares to be placed with small number investors rather than
offered via prospectus. No underwriting.

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________________________________________________________________________


Thread: 14
Subject: Circular to Employees/Ex Employees

Date: Tue, 21 Oct 2003 21:18:18 +1000
From: "Paul S Davis" <psdavis@a...>
Subject: Circular To Employees/Ex Employees

I received my "Circular To Employees/Ex Employees" requesting that I
fill out a Form 535 by the 18 Nov so that I will be eligible to
participate in the 8th Dec dividend or else I will be excluded from
the benefit
of the dividend.

Have others received their letters?

==========

Date: Wed, 22 Oct 2003 07:49:55 +1000
From: Mark Shannon <mshannon@v...>
Subject: RE: Circular To Employees/Ex Employees

I have also received the letter from DTT last night. All appears to be
correct, although they have calculated 2 weeks for "Notice" whereas I
was
under the impression that the notice period was supposed to be for a
month.
Everything else is correct. Does anyone else have that same impression
on
notice?
Thanks.

==========

Date: Wed, 22 Oct 2003 08:18:56 +1000
From: Elizabeth Fullerton <laslig@o...>
Subject: Re: RE: Circular To Employees/Ex Employees

... I also noticed the 2 weeks in lieu of notice. My contract says 4, and
also they
mention a month's notice in the front page, so I'm just going to change
it. Don't
let 'em get away with a penny! (or, at least, a penny more than they
already are)

==========

Date: Wed, 22 Oct 2003 12:30:46 +1000
From: "Steve Gerlach" <gerlach@a...>
Subject: RE: Re: Re: Circular To Employees/Ex Employees

My birth date is correct.

I have 1 month's Notice, not 2 weeks.

I'm damned if I know WHY we have to fill in FORM 535 AGAIN when we did
it a year ago!

I take it that we have to HALVE the figures quoted, as that will be our
final payout, and halve them AGAIN because this is payment one of two,
correct?

==========

Date: Wed, 22 Oct 2003 13:05:51 +1000
From: "Tom Northey" <tn@d...>
Subject: Re: Re: Re: Circular To Employees/Ex Employees

The amount you'll get in the first payment is...
your_total * $790K / sum_of_all_totals

Note that sum of all totals is approx $3.67M based on the oft-quoted
43% and
$1.58M.

Does anyone know anything about the "Bonus on notice", "bonus on
redundancy"
and "OSS delivery bonus". These are all zero on my form (of course
zero
redundancy -> zero bonus on redundancy" but what about the others?).

==========

Date: Wed, 22 Oct 2003 13:36:18 +1000
From: Mark Shannon <mshannon@v...>
Subject: RE: Re: Re: Circular To Employees/Ex Employees

Tom,

Same as mine:

$0 for Bonus on Redundancy
$0 for Bonus on notice
$0 for Bonus on OSS Delivery

I have never these "Categories" before. Don't know what they are about.

==========

Date: Wed, 22 Oct 2003 03:37:34 -0000
From: nick4mony
Subject: Re: Circular To Employees/Ex Employees

The full amount goes on the form. You go through the half-by-half
exercise only in your mind, and only if you need to give a boost to
your sense of cynicism.

I haven't got my circular yet, but when I do, I'll take a good day or
two to study everything, read the instructions (if any), read their
prevous circulars, and double-check everything.

For those that also had ordinary unsecured debts (eg taxi fares),
don't worry about it because that comes from the other fund which (at
this rate) will be fully dealt with when the Earth is demolished for
an intergalactic bypass in 2 million years time.

==========

Date: Wed, 22 Oct 2003 11:14:09 -0000
From: nick4mony
Subject: Car payments and other salary sacrifice

A few comments are floating around that people with car payments have
found they are missing from their calculations of entitlements.

This is because these are Ordinary Unsecured Debt (ie from the other
Unsecured Creditors Fund). You will get approximately 20% of this.

I have seen something in one of the submissions mentioning the issue,
that these payments attract the lower priority of Ordinary Unsecured
Debt (ie with trade creditors).

This is an anomoly in the Corporations Act, and I am delving more into
it. Of course it is stupid that a private decision as to how someone
spends their money can influence its priority. The system shouldn't
care whether you spend your money on slow horses and fast women, or
anything else.

==========

Date: Fri, 24 Oct 2003 16:45:16 +1000
From: Ben Castan <bcastan@b...>
Subject: RE: Re: Circular To Employees/Ex Employees

The OSS Delivery bonus was for the people who worked on the Comindico
Roll out. It really was for the delivery of the first cut of call agent
code, but they were generous and gave it to all people involved in the
Comindico Rollout.
No idea about the others.

==========

Date: Fri, 24 Oct 2003 07:01:13 -0000
From: "grshirley" <GSHIRLEY@I...>
Subject: Re: Circular To Employees/Ex Employees

The Bonus on notice and Bonus on Redundancy were, from what I can
remember, the 15% extra redundancy we were promised for being stupid
enough to hang around after the previous redundancy round.

==========

Date: Mon, 27 Oct 2003 23:20:38 +1100
From: "Tom Northey" <tn@d...>
Subject: Re: Re: Circular To Employees/Ex Employees

It doesn't apply to Melbourne apparently. They probably offered it in
Sydney, because the work in Sydney was (in part?) based on specific
projects
with specific end-dates.

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Thread: 15
Subject: Sallie, not Sally

Date: Wed, 22 Oct 2003 10:58:41 -0000
From: nick4mony
Subject: Sallie, not Sally

--- In openvictims@..., Discovery95 <discovery95@b...>
wrote:
> SUBJECT: Re: Just spoke to Sally. Who hasn't yet...

> She is a legend, (compared to other DTT yobbo's.)

To avoid getting her off-side, note that it is SALLIE, not Sally.

From a guy who worked with "Barrie", and also with "Manda"

Nick.

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Thread: 16
Subject: Tax Rates

Date: Thu, 23 Oct 2003 07:37:11 -0000
From: "start_monday" <start_monday@y...>
Subject: tax rates

I spoke with Sally Muir who confirmed that dividends from the fund
will be taxed :

unpaid wages - 21.5 %
unpaid leave - 31.5 %

Someone may like to query redundancies etc.

==========

Date: Thu, 23 Oct 2003 18:32:02 +1000
From: Tom Northey <tn@d...>
Subject: Re: tax rates

http://www.ato.gov.au/content/downloads/n3351.pdf "Unused Leave
Payments on
Termination of Employment"
says payment for unused leave and long service leave (in case of
redundancies) is taxed at 31.5%.

http://www.ato.gov.au/content/downloads/n3349.pdf "Eligible
Termination
Payments" says
ETP is taxed at 21.5%. The ETP is that part of the payment for notice
and
redundancy that exceeds the tax free limit. You can roll the ETP into
a
super fund and avoid the tax, but I doubt many people will exceed the
tax
free limit for notice and redundancy.

http://www.ato.gov.au/super/content.asp?doc=/content/19824.htm says
The tax-free limit for the 2002/2003 year is a flat dollar amount of
$5,623
plus $2,812 for each completed year of service. [We may get into the
2003/2004 tax year so presumably that is higher but I couldn't find
it.]
Completed years of service include periods of annual leave and long
service
leave taken. If the payment is more than the tax-free limit, the amount
over
the limit is an eligible termination payment (ETP).

Above is provided you provide TFN.

Also see
Lump sum payments in arrears
http://tinyurl.com/s0io or
http://www.ato.gov.au/individuals/content.asp?doc=/content/19854.htm&pc=001/002/\
037/008&mnu=992&mfp=001/002&st=&cy=1

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Thread: 17
Subject: Years Service calculation

Date: Wed, 29 Oct 2003 23:43:25 +1100
From: "Tan Diep" <tandiep@o...>
Subject: "Years Service" calculation



For those who joined OT between 27-July to 26-August who got retrenched
on 26-July-2002, you might want to re-calculate your "Years Service"
because you might be entitled to more weeks for your redundancy.

Example:
I joined OT on 8 August 2000.
OT retrenced me on 26 July 2002.
Deloitte caluclated my "Years Service" based on the above date to be
1.96.
BUT, with OT giving a month notice, this would push my termination date
to 26 August 2002.
Re-calculation of my "Years Service" based on my new end date should be
2.05.

With this new calculation, I have 2 more weeks for my redundancy.
Spoken to Morgan Kelly and he agreed verbally over the phone after
putting me on hold to seek advice from the lawyer.
He then asked me to put on the Form 535 and send it back and they will
review it.

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Thread: 18
Subject: Superannuation issues

Date: Wed, 22 Oct 2003 06:29:17 +1000
From: "Paul S Davis" <psdavis@a...>
Subject: Re: Circular To Employees/Ex Employees

It is not clear to my why we would not include superannuation on our
proof
of debt form. The initial advice from the ATO over the phone was that
DTT in
entirely reasonability for paying super and the ATO didn't want to be
involved. I am seek a written statement from the ATO (slow process)
and
will now send the last information from DTT to them.

==========

Date: Wed, 22 Oct 2003 06:46:26 +1000
From: "Richard Watson" <rwatson@s...>
Subject: RE: Circular To Employees/Ex Employees

... I gather from Deloitte's circular of 17 October
that the Superannuation Guarantee Legislation stipulates that
superannuation must be paid to the ATO before being paid into a roll
over fund.

==========

Date: Wed, 22 Oct 2003 04:38:38 -0000
From: nick4mony
Subject: Re: Circular To Employees - Superannuation issues

--- In openvictims@..., "Paul S Davis" <psdavis@a...>
wrote:
> It is not clear to my why we would not include superannuation on our
proof
> of debt form. The initial advice from the ATO over the phone was
that DTT in
> entirely reasonability for paying super and the ATO didn't want to be
> involved. I am seek a written statement from the ATO (slow process)
and
> will now send the last information from DTT to them.

I have had a detailed discussion with Robert Hodge from the Australian
Super Funds Association.

Salient points:
- You do not list super on your form, because the ATO owns the debt.
- The ATO is able to make the claim on behalf of all of us (that is
to say for:
=> those whose only outstanding item was super AND ALSO
=> those who have other outstanding debts as well).
- The ATO is prevented by privacy law from actually saying what
action they are taking.
- We could try asking the Administrator whether they have received a
claim from the ATO.

The conclusion is that we are in a difficult situation, when it comes
to super.

More detail from ASFA:
- Under the old rules, super was to be paid once a year. The due
date for payment is 28 July 2002 (or 2003) for the 1 July - 30 June
year, and is payable to the MLC (or whatever) fund.
- If the super remains unpaid after that date (28 July 2002) then it
becomes a debt owed to the Tax Office (ATO). It is not a debt owed to
you, so you do not list it on your proof of debt form, and you do not
have any enforcement rights.
- We cannot ask the company (or administrator) to pay the overdue
super into our fund (MLC or otherwise). This answers Richard Watson's
question.
- We can notify the ATO given that our super has not been paid.
[While Paul has done this in a generalistic way, you may wish to write
a quick note to the ATO listing what you are owed. Get this figure
from the first Statement of Personal Entitlement issued last year. ]
- While the ATO is able to make a claim, there is no way that we can
force them to do so.
- If the ATO fails to claim, they (and us) may lose our rights to
ever claim on that super (which seems fairly obviously so from the
Deed).
- The super issue is legally a matter between the Company (as a
taxpayer) and the ATO. The privacy laws prohibit the ATO from
disclosing anything about this matter to any third party (including
any of us). This is probably why Paul is getting nonsense from them.
- When the Administrator pays the ATO (for super), the ATO works out
who our current fund is and pays the money. Robert wasn't too sure if
the ATO writes us a letter at that stage, but the voucher system they
used last year no longer operates.


My own thoughts ...
This places us into a difficult situation.

Obviously the same privacy laws do not apply to the Administrator, so
they may elect to tell us whether they have received a claim from the
ATO. We may be able to use recent additions to the privacy act that
gives us the right of access to personal information held by companies
(and administrators). We have a "beneficial interest" in the debt
owed to the ATO, and therefore have a beneficial interest in the
information about the ATO Super claim.


You can call the ASFA on (02) 9264 9300 or 1800 812798 (which works).

==========

Date: Wed, 22 Oct 2003 16:11:11 +1000
From: "Tom Northey" <tn@d...>
Subject: Re: Re: Circular To Employees - Superannuation issues

The statement "Employees should note that ...all amounts outstanding
wrt
Super...including assocaited penalties and interest...will be paid
directly
to ... ATO on your behalf" sounds binding on Deloitte.

They are not saying they are only going to pay if ATO claims it.

I note also that there are penalties and interest on the super. Woo
hoo.
Open a bottle of lemonade - a *large* one if you please!

==========

Date: Wed, 22 Oct 2003 19:11:43 +1000
From: "Paul S Davis" <psdavis@a...>
Subject: Re: Re: Circular To Employees - Superannuation issues

> - You do not list super on your form, because the ATO owns the
debt.
In a phone conversation with the ATO they deny that owe the debt,
because as
usual we are covered by a DOCA and it is the IP responsibility. I'm try
to
get this in writing from the ATO.

========= End of summary ==========