How 2degrees took the pain out of gifting and FBT with Extraordinary and TaxLab.

2degrees is one of New Zealand's largest telecommunications providers, with a national workforce and gifting happening across the business all year round.

For Kyrene Frisken, Tax Manager and Technical Accounting Lead at 2degrees, every FBT return meant days of chasing gift cards. A little over a year after moving gifting to Extraordinary, that work is now a light check.

The results

• 3–5 days of gift card prep each FBT return, down to a light check
• About 75% utilisation, so no FBT on the other 25%
• About 5% of gifted value returned to the business so far
• One source of truth, with a full audit trail

The challenge: chasing plastic

2degrees has used TaxLab for FBT for seven years. Attribution, salary data and sign-off were all automated. Gift cards were the exception.

Every quarter, the tax team worked through the general ledger line by line to find gift card spend. Then came the chasing: emails and Teams messages to managers to find out who received each card. Cards bought but not yet handed out had to be tracked quarter after quarter.

"We would go down these wild goose chases of: you received this many gift cards, who did you give it to? Oh, I gave it to Sarah. Which Sarah? There was a lot of emails, Teams messages, chasing back and forth that was not value adding."

With gifts going out across the business for different reasons, that meant three to five days of work for every FBT return.

The solution: Extraordinary + TaxLab

2degrees moved its gifting to Extraordinary. Gifts go straight to employees' phones as a digital card, and every transaction is captured at the source.

Kyrene had one key requirement: everything needed to be on an employee ID basis.

"My biggest specification is everything needed to be on an employee ID basis, so it can be anonymised and uploaded into TaxLab seamlessly."

After an initial reconciliation against the general ledger, the data has been trusted ever since. Extraordinary also automatically splits out gift recipients who aren't employees, so only FBT-able benefits flow into the return.

"When it came to adoption or migration, it really couldn't have been easier."

The results

A light check, not days of chasing. Gift card prep that took three to five days each FBT return is now a quick review.

"We get the perfect information in the Extraordinary platform, and it's trustworthy every time, so we can pick it up, do light checks, and then essentially put it in the FBT return. It really is that simple."

Only paying FBT on what's spent. 2degrees sees utilisation of about 75%. FBT is only paid when employees actually spend, which also gives a timing benefit.

"About 25% hasn't been used by the employee and we haven't had to pay FBT on it."

Money back in the business. When gifts expire, the unspent amount comes back to 2degrees, with no FBT paid on it. A little over a year in, about 5% of gifted value has been returned.

Data they never had before. One dashboard gives a perfect audit trail, and employees can be grouped to report on gifting across the business.

"We have data that we never had before. It's hard to compare when you have all the information that you need within Extraordinary versus the black hole of those plastic gift cards."

- Kyrene Frisken, Tax Manager and Technical Accounting Lead, 2degrees

FAQs

How does 2degrees handle FBT on employee gifts? Gifting runs through Extraordinary, and the data uploads into TaxLab by employee ID. FBT is calculated on what employees actually spend.

How much time did 2degrees save? Gift card prep for each FBT return dropped from three to five days to a light check.

What happens to unspent gift money? It comes back to 2degrees when the gift expires, with no FBT paid on it. About 5% has been returned so far.

Hear it from Kyrene

Kyrene shared the full 2degrees story in our webinar, Christmas Gifting, Sorted: FBT Made Simple for 2026, alongside a live demo of Extraordinary and TaxLab working together.

Watch the recording

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