Budget speech Big Idea? Buckle Down!

Dear fellow taxpayer,

Last week was an important one for South Africa and her financial forecasts: Trevor Manuel delivered his budget speech on Wednesday, 11 February 2009. Our managing editor of Simplify your Tax, Nadia Pisanti, was lucky enough to attend a discussion on his speech at Ernest and Young early on Thursday morning, and had the following gems to offer...

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Budget speech Big Idea? Buckle Down!

Jackie’s very kindly let me filch some of her space to bring you some news from the panel of experts at last week’s discussion of the Finance Minister’s budget speech. They had the following to say:

Dave Thayser – Africa Leader of Human Capital Tax Services

In terms of the budget itself, Dave said there’ll be a shortfall in revenue collection, which means SARS is likely to become even more aggressive when it comes to collections.

What this means for you?

You’re probably NOT going to enjoy the same extensions to file your tax returns as you did at the beginning of this year. 

Mark Goulding – Transaction Advisory Services Director

One of the major issues Mark discussed was SARS clamping down on the time employers take to submit employees’ IRP5s.

10% penalty!

If you as an employer fail to submit your employees’ IRP5s within the 60 days time-limit SARS allocates to you, you’ll have to pay a 10% penalty of the entire employee’s tax your company pays. If you’re a significantly large company, this could roll into hundreds of thousands of rands!

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Have a good week,

Jackie Arendse