Sars insists e-filing system intact

SA REVENUE Service (Sars) yesterday denied reports that its e-filing system for tax returns was on the verge of collapse.

This comes after Sars official Andre Rabie said on Tuesday the e-filing tax system would crash in the next two years unless they urgently recall Barry Hore, who masterminded the IT system dubbed “Modernisation”.

Rabie was testifying before Judge Robert Nugent’s commission of inquiry into governance and administrative issues at Sars. It was reported that it would cost about R1 billion to fix the Sars IT infrastructure after its modernisation programme was abruptly halted in 2014 when suspended commissioner Tom Moyane took over.

But the revenue service said the perception created, that the e-filing system was on the verge of collapse, was incorrect.

“Sars would like to assure taxpayers that Sars’ e-filing system is stable and performing well within specification, as evidenced by the system’s uptime at a rate of 99.7%. Already 3.3 million tax returns have been filed, with 50.4% of these via e-filing. The platform has handled an average traffic volume of 25 000 tax returns daily,” it said.

“The concern expressed by Sars executives testifying at the commission of inquiry centred around the compatibility of e-filing and web browsers towards the year 2020 time frame. This concern is associated with a future risk, and not a reflection on the current capacity, functionality or stability of Sars’ systems.”

Sars said the e-filing system continued to be its premier preferred filing channel and had been capacitated to process high transaction volumes. |