36Commissioner may collect tax from person owing money to employer

36 Commissioner may collect tax from person owing money to employer

(1) The Commissioner may, by notice in writing (a copy of which shall be furnished to the employer) require: (a) a person by whom any money is due or accruing, or may become due, to an employer; (b) a person who holds, or may subsequently hold, money for or on account of an employer; (c) a person who holds, or may subsequently hold, money for or on account of some other person for payment to an employer; or (d) a person having authority from another person to pay money to an employer; to pay to the Commissioner, either forthwith upon the money becoming due or being held, or at or within a time specified in the notice (not being a time before the money becomes due or is held): (e) so much of the money as is sufficient to pay an amount due in respect of tax by the employer, or the whole of the money when it is equal to or less than that amount; or (f) such amount as is specified in the notice out of each of any payments that the person so notified becomes liable from time to time to make to the employer, until the amount due in respect of tax by the employer is satisfied; and may at any time, by further notice in writing, amend or revoke the first‑mentioned notice, or extend the time for making any payment in pursuance of that notice. (1A) A person who refuses or fails to comply with a notice under subsection (1) is guilty of an offence punishable on conviction by a fine not exceeding $1,000. (1B) Where a person (in this subsection referred to as the convicted person) is convicted before a court of an offence against subsection (1A) in relation to the refusal or failure of the convicted person or another person to comply with a notice under this subsection (1), the court may, in addition to imposing a penalty on the convicted person, order the convicted person to pay to the Commissioner an amount not exceeding the amount that the convicted person or the other person, as the case may be, refused or failed to pay to the Commissioner in accordance with the notice. (2) A person making a payment in pursuance of this section shall be deemed to have been acting under the authority of the employer and of all other persons concerned and is, by force of this subsection, indemnified in respect of that payment. (3) If the Commissioner receives a payment in respect of the amount due by the employer before payment is made by the person so notified, he or she shall forthwith give notice of receipt of the payment to that person. (4) Where: (a) money has been paid by a person to a building society in respect of the issue of shares in the capital of the society (not being shares listed for quotation on a Stock Exchange); and (b) the money has not been repaid; the money shall, for the purposes of this section, be taken: (c) in a case where the money is repayable on demand—to be due by the building society to the person; or (d) in any other case—to be money that may become due by the building society to the person. (5) Where, but for this subsection, money is not due, or repayable on demand, to a person unless a condition is fulfilled, the money shall be taken, for the purposes of this section, to be due, or repayable on demand, as the case may be, to the person notwithstanding that the condition has not been fulfilled. (6) In this section: