SARS deadline looms

Provisional taxpayers are a smaller segment of the country's tax base comprising any person who received income which does not constitute remuneration.

January 31 is also the deadline for the payment of outstanding assessed tax by non-provisional taxpayers who filed their returns via eFiling, for whom the filing deadline was on 23 November 2012.

"As part of the range of incentives to use eFiling, taxpayers are given until 31 January to make payment on an assessed tax liability irrespective of when they submitted their returns, giving them up to seven months interest free to make the payment.

"An important proviso, however, is that failure to make payment by 31 January 2013 will trigger back-dated interest," said SARS in a statement.

As of 21 January 2013, SARS had received a total of 6 080 554 tax returns since the start of the 2012 Filing Season. Of these 4 496 054 - a 13% increase from 2011 - are for the 2012 Tax Season, and 1 584 500 - a 24% increase from 2011 - are from previous years.

Additionally, of the returns received to date, approximately 15.9% resulted in an additional tax liability totalling R7.21 billion which is R348 million more than the R3.45 billion paid in 2011.