Several taxpayers have received threats from SARS that they are facing legal action because their tax payments are in arrears, says a Business Day report. However, it appears many of these taxpayers have filed objections to the assessments issued by SARS.

The objections were also accompanied by applications for the suspension of payment until the disputes were settled. SARS spokesperson Sicelo Mkosi says that once a suspension has been applied for, its processes do not allow for collection steps to proceed until 10 days after SARS has notified the taxpayer of the result of the suspension request.

‘If taxpayers are receiving final demands in this period, that is incorrect. Such examples should be escalated to SARS via the SARS complaints process so that SARS can rectify the situation,’ he said.

Tax practitioners have raised concern that SARS does not comply with the 60-day timeframe allowed for responses to objections. When the lack of response is queried by e-mail to the SARS contact e-mail addresses, the response is that the turnaround time for a query is 21 working days. ‘The taxpayer now faces the prospect of having to wait effectively another month before a response is produced,’ a tax practitioner noted. He also said the debt recovery process seems to be detached from the electronic filing process, where the objection and suspension of payment applications are lodged.

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