Cape Town - The South African Revenue Service (SARS) is to introduce a range of improvements to the filing process to improve its service to taxpayers.
This was conveyed by Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan, tabling his department's Budget Vote in the Parliament on Wednesday, a day which also marked the start of the new tax season.
SARS will, for the first time this year, be validating bank accounts of taxpayers to avoid delays in refunds which affected about 400 000 taxpayers last year.
Minister Gordhan said taxpayers will also receive a tax return with a high level of accuracy of information which SARS would have pre-populated onto their returns.
The revenue service will also provide taxpayers with a statement of account - a history of the taxes they've paid and the returns they've submitted as far back as 1999.
According to SARS, last years' tax season confirmed that electronic filing was the preferred method of submission by taxpayers.
"Just two years after the introduction of electronic submission for individual returns, over 86 percent of all returns were submitted via either the SARS eFiling system or electronically at our branches," SARS said in a statement.
Minister Gordhan said SARS will this financial year employ an additional 1 000 auditors and specialists in finance and banking, to intensify its focus on high-net worth individuals and their tax behaviour while there will also be a focus on unravelling tax schemes aimed at aggressive tax avoidance.
"Already last week, SARS issued over 7 000 letters of penalties to businesses who failed to comply with the PAYE filing requirements. This includes those companies who filed late," said Minister Gordhan.
A further 4 000 cases, where employers have failed to submit the tax, have been referred for criminal investigation and prosecution, he said.
The deadline for the submission of manual tax returns is 18 September and 20 November for electronic submissions.
