JOHANNESBURG – The South African Payroll Association (Sapa) has laid down the marker for the SA Revenue Services (Sars) over what is called an ongoing statement of account errors in some of the country's biggest companies.
The organisation said yesterday that it would meet with SA Revenue Services acting head Mark Kingon later this month to resolve the issue.
However, Sapa warned that should a solution not be found in the said meeting, it would approach the Tax Ombud for a resolution. Sapa board chairperson Arlene Leggat said they would highlight the issues received from their members and request resolution from Sars. “If a company has tried to resolve its issues with Sars, but it has proof, case numbers, and correspondence; then it is time to go to the Tax Ombud who will further assist in obtaining final resolution,” Leggat said.
Sapa charged that when large organisations submit their EMP201 to Sars, it indicated how much it has deducted from their employees’ pay for tax purposes. The deductions are then subsequently paid over to Sars, clearing an organisation’s account with the revenue collector. Employers are by law required to pay contributions to both Sars or the UIF commissioner, depending on which one is applicable to the employer. The total PAYE, UIF, SDL amounts must be paid over on the EMP201 return within seven days after the end of the month to which the payment relates.
However, Sapa said its issue with the tax man was that Sars compiled all this information into journals, but that there were no particular reasons for these journals and no one in Sars could explain what purposes they served.
Leggat said these journals often resulted in accounting errors, and subsequently an underpayment reflecting on a particular company's statement of account.
“If an organisation reflects an under-payment at Sars, they are deemed non-tax compliant and, therefore, cannot receive tax clearance from the agency. If a company does not carry tax clearance, it cannot do business – it really is that simple.”
Sars in an emailed response could not confirm if indeed a meeting would take place and said it would respond to detailed questions when the organisation was “ready”.
Sapa said it would ask Kingon to set a committed team or point of contact in place at Sars, who would deal with any statement of account issues that might arise.