Errant SA taxpayers get breathing space

PARLIAMENT’S standing committee on finance has agreed to a further twomonth extension to the special voluntary disclosure programme, which is aimed at giving noncompliant taxpayers the opportunity to regularise their financial affairs without facing heavy penalties.

The decision follows intense lobbying by tax practitioners and financial advisers, who said during public hearings on the proposal that more time was needed for their clients to collect all the required documentation and submit their applications.

Committee chairman Yunus Carrim said there was a view that more people were likely to come forward under the programme if they had more time.

The original deadline for the programme was the end of March 2017. Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan then agreed to a two-month extension until the end of June. The committee agreed on Wednesday that a further extension was desirable.

Carrim said that an extension beyond August would not make sense as the automatic exchange of information between tax authorities under the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development programme would take effect from September next year.

From then on the South African Revenue Service would have access to the tax situation of noncompliant taxpayers anyway and would not need their co-operation.

The coming into force of this exchange system will put taxpayers under pressure to regularise their tax affairs under the voluntary disclosure programme rather than having to pay heavy penalties when exposed by way of the automatic exchange of information.

The committee would yesterday vote formally on the Rates and Monetary Amounts and Amendment of Revenue Laws Bill, which contains the proposal, and it will be debated in the National Assembly on Tuesday next week.

Treasury deputy director-general Ismail Momoniat said Treasury did not have a problem with the decision to extend the programme for a further two months if this made it easier for taxpayers to comply. The fact that the bill would be passed by parliament quite late also justified a further extension. — BDLive