600,000 tax clearance certificates issued

Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan said in the medium-term budget policy statement that tax compliance was used as a determinant of "good standing" when the state had to decide whether to award a government tender or not.

Tax clearance certificates are a necessary tool used by government to determine the tax compliance of a company‚ yet there had been corruption in the process of issuing the certificates.

Gordhan said SARS had developed an electronic mechanism for taxpayers to provide real-time‚ up-to-date and continuous tax status to interested parties.

The use of a unique one-time access pin will significantly reduce the scope for fraud and abuse of paper-based tax clearance certificates‚ he said.

The changes will be implemented at the start of the next financial year.