Tag: Value Added Tax (VAT)

The Finance Minister, Tito Mboweni, used the opportunity in the National Budget Speech to address the concerns raised by many South African citizens, corporates and international ratings agencies.

As an election year, a second State of the Nation Address (SONA) will probably be held during June 2019 wherein the newly elected government will present their programme of action for the 2020 financial year. The SONA address that was delivered by President Cyril Ramaphosa on Thursday 7 February 2019, accordingly reflected on the Medium Term Strategic Frameworks designed and implemented in the past five years.

To err is human and mistakes are sometimes made on tax invoices. Treasury has thus deemed it necessary to amend section 20 of the Value Added Tax Act 89 of 1991 (Act) which sets out the requirements for issuing tax invoices.

It was clear going into this Medium Term Budget Policy Statement (MTBPS) that is was going to be much tougher than previous years, simply because economic growth and tax revenues are so much worse than had been forecast.

With the wave of anti-South African Revenue Service (SARS) sentiment currently washing over South Africa, paying historical value-added tax (VAT) may be a hard pill to swallow. This has resulted in many companies understating or underpaying their VAT and subsequently incurring colossal penalties in addition to the tax payable.

A major concern on the minds of business and the public in general is how tax revenue collections are performing and whether we can expect further tax increases in the 2019 Budget.

Can SARS refuse to pay a VAT refund on grounds that income tax is due? This is the question which the court had to address in Top Watch (Pty) Ltd v CSARS.

It is no secret that tax systems around the world are struggling to keep pace with the digitisation of commerce and South Africa too, after an initially pro-active stance towards taxing e-commerce, was arguably starting to fall behind in this 'new frontier for VAT'.

Treasury has proposed certain amendments to the Income Tax Act relating to the tax treatment of cryptocurrencies in the recently issued Draft Taxation Laws Amendment Bill (draft TLAB).

An increase in the Value Added Tax (VAT) rate to 15% will came into effect on 1 April 2018. Generally, the sale of residential property is subject to transfer duty, however, if a seller is a VAT vendor, such as a property developer, VAT may be payable. How will the VAT increase effect the sale of residential property, where a property is purchased before 1 April but transfer only occurs after the date of the increase?