Gordhan‚ Magashula to launch tax season

2 Jul 2012

Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan and the South African Revenue Services (SARS) Commissioner Oupa Magashula will launch the 2012 tax season in Pretoria today.

(Image: GCIS)

July 1 is the day that marks the opening of the tax season‚ in which individuals and trusts can submit their returns.

SARS said that details of the 2012 tax season will be announced today.

The revenue service has indicated it would introduce a range of new‚ innovative‚ technology solutions and applications that would help taxpayers with the completion and submission of their tax returns through the internet‚ cell phones‚ and smart phones.

Rob Stretch‚ tax director at Ernst & Young‚ expected individual income tax to be between 8% and 10% higher in the 2012 tax season.

"This is because most taxpayers have had salary increases‚" he said.

SARS has in the past managed to collect above-target revenues. In the last tax season‚ it managed to collect R742.7bn‚ R4bn above the targeted R738.7bn.

For the 2011/12 fiscal year‚ about 13.7 million individuals‚ two million companies and 652‚000 Value Added Tax (VAT) vendors contributed to the collected revenue.

Efficient Group chief economist Dawie Roodt also backed views that SARS would collect meaningful revenue despite continuing job losses and some companies reducing operations.

Roodt said above-target collections could again be expected this year mainly because Minister Gordhan was "usually quite conservative" when setting revenue targets.

Strengthening the revenue base was key for resource mobilisation for sustainable development‚ poverty reduction and resilience of public finances to external shocks‚ Vitaliy Kramarenko‚ Africa Regional Technical Assistance Centre South (AFRITAC South) coordinator said.

AFRITAC South‚ a unit of the International Monetary Fund‚ held a four day tax seminar in Johannesburg‚ which ended on Thursday.

During the seminar‚ participants shared information about data collection‚ tax gaps and tax compliance analyses.

"The discussed analytical tools will help participants analyse the sources of the so-called tax gaps and elaborate strategies for reducing leakages in the tax systems‚" Kramarenko said.

SARS has lost billions of rand in revenue due to tax non-compliance by individuals and companies.

Stretch said that while the revenue service had increased measures to deal with tax evaders‚ there would continue to be "delinquent" taxpayers.

"This problem is no different in any other country. They [SARS] need to police the system better‚" he said.

Source: I-Net Bridge

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