Australia ABN Status Portfolio Monitor

Watch a list of Australian Business Numbers (ABNs) and receive typed status / change events when free official Australian Business Register (ABR) fields flip — ABN cancelled / reactivated, GST registered / cancelled, entity name, entity type. Not another ABR directory scrape. Not CreditorWatch / Illion / paid ASIC extracts.

Honest coverage (read before buying)

Included (free ABR GUID web services)	Not included
ABN status: Active / Cancelled	Credit scores, payment defaults, court actions (CreditorWatch)
GST registration presence + from-date	Historical bulk ABR dumps / nationwide sweeps
Entity name + entity type code/name	Director / officeholder registers
Lookup by 11-digit ABN (ATO checksum) on your watchlist only	CreditorWatch HTML or paid APIs
Official ABR web services (free GUID registration)	Instant streaming; sub-hour guarantees

Live path: per-ABN poll of official ABR JSON helper / XML SearchByABN (GUID required). First observation stores a baseline (no charge). Quiet days ≈ $0 product charges.

Legal: Free ABR web services under the published Web Services Agreement (GUID by email). Do not treat this as an official ATO/ABR product. Store GUID as a secret input.

Value proposition

• ABN watchlist × ABR snapshot diff → ABN_CANCELLED, ABN_REACTIVATED, GST_REGISTERED, GST_CANCELLED, ENTITY_NAME_CHANGED, ENTITY_TYPE_CHANGED.
• Official free ABR path only. No CreditorWatch key.
• Pay only for unique delivered change events. Durable KVS checkpoint + event_uid dedupe.

PRODUCTION USE (required for real monitoring)

Store default ≠ product. Schema defaults use sourceMode=fixture so Apify Store daily auto-tests leave a non-empty health dataset without calling ABR. That fixture path only writes a non-billable RUN_STATUS / FIXTURE_HEALTH row. It is not ABR monitoring.

For production monitoring you must:

1. Register a free ABR GUID at ABR Web Services
2. Set sourceMode = live
3. Set secret input abrGuid
4. Provide your abns watchlist
5. Schedule runs (daily is typical; ABR is not a sub-hour stream)

Official references:

• ABR web services methods
• ABR web services registration
• JSON helper: https://abr.business.gov.au/json/AbnDetails.aspx?abn={ABN}&guid={GUID}&callback=c
• XML SearchByABN: https://abr.business.gov.au/ABRXMLSearch/AbrXmlSearch.asmx/SearchByABNv202001

Honest limit: ABR update-event search is postcode/state scoped for bulk discovery — this Actor polls watched ABNs via SearchByABN rather than nationwide update sweeps.

Apify Store daily auto-test / default input

Field	Default
abns	["51824753556","53004085616"]
signalGroups	status, gst, identity
sourceMode	fixture
emitFixtureDemoEvents	false
maxRunSeconds	55
requestPaceMs	300

On that path the Actor SUCCEEDS quickly, pushes exactly one RUN_STATUS / FIXTURE_HEALTH row (billable: false), and does not charge abn-status-event-delivered.

Input (summary)

Field	Notes
abns	Watchlist (required, 11-digit ATO checksum)
signalGroups	status, gst, identity
sourceMode	fixture (default) or live
abrGuid	Secret; required for live
emitFixtureDemoEvents	Default false
asOfHint	Optional as_of hint
maxRunSeconds / maxEvents	Budgets
resumeFromCheckpoint	Default true
requestPaceMs	Default 300 (raise on 429)

Production example

{
  "abns": ["51824753556", "53004085616", "49004028077"],
  "signalGroups": ["status", "gst", "identity"],
  "sourceMode": "live",
  "abrGuid": "<secret-guid>",
  "asOfHint": "2026-09-16",
  "maxRunSeconds": 300,
  "requestPaceMs": 300,
  "resumeFromCheckpoint": true
}

Output

Change events (billable under PPE)

Typed rows include: abn, entity_name, event_type, event_subtype, changed_fields, previous_value, new_value, as_of, evidence, summary, source_url, event_uid, entity_type_code, billable: true.

RUN_STATUS (never billed)

Every successful run pushes one health row (FIXTURE_HEALTH | MONITOR_IDLE | CATCHUP_COMPLETE | HEALTH_OK).

Pricing

Pay-per-event: abn-status-event-delivered at $0.02 per delivered unique change event ($20 / 1,000). Single tier (see docs/monetization.md and ADR 0010). Health / baseline / duplicate / fixture rows are never charged.

Local development

cd actors/australia-abn-status-portfolio-monitor
npm install
npm test
npm run build
apify run -p

Attribution

Data originates from the Australian Business Register via free official web services. Not an official ATO/ABR product. Not CreditorWatch.