SARS has published a notice outlining which South Africans have to submit a tax return in 2021. Gugulethu Mfuphi spoke to Jean Du Toit, Head Of Tax Technical At Tax Consulting SA.
The conversation breakdown the requirements and which South Africans don’t have to submit this year and who must file an income tax return.
Listen to the full conversation here:
The guidance note is aimed at helping taxpayers to make this determination ahead of the filing season starting on 1 July 2021.
Who should file?
Your total salary for the year before tax was not more than R500 000 and employees’ tax has been deducted or withheld in terms of the deduction tables prescribed by the Commissioner
» You only received employment income for the full year of assessment (March 2020 to February 2021) from one employer
» You have no car allowance/company car/ travel allowance or other income (e.g. interest or rental income); and » You are not claiming tax related deductions (e.g. medical expenses, retirement annuity contributions other than pension contributions made by your employer, travel).
The closing dates / SARS deadlines for Tax Season are as follows: 31 October 2021 for branch filing. 4 December 2021 for non-provisional taxpayers who use eFiling and the MobiApp. 31 January 2022 for provisional taxpayers who use eFiling.
Also Read: SARS doing an audit of South Africans who bought cryptocurrency
If you’ve been working from home, here’s how to claim from SARS
Did you know that if you’ve been working from home, you can get money back from the South African Revenue Services?
According to senior tax technical at TaxTrim, Elani van der Westhuizen, you can claim a tax deduction if you worked from home for more than half of your total working hours or for more than six months during the tax year that started in March 2020.
“Claim for your home office if you started working from home at the end of March, and worked there for at least 6 months till the end of February 2021, to deduct this benefit in the tax year,” she explained.
Also Read: Get money back from the South African Revenue Services



