How to use SARS' new eFiling system

[Bradley Prior]

How to use SARS' new eFiling system

The South African Revenue Services (SARS) has opened the 2019 tax season for taxpayers who use its digital channels - eFiling and the SARS MobiApp.

This tax season has been staggered to improve service to taxpayers and encourage conversion to online filing.

 

[rambo919]

OTP's? Does it still timeout as soon as you are not looking? This can get aggravating...

 

[PegZ]

OTP's? Does it still timeout as soon as you are not looking? This can get aggravating...

Yes it does timeout - it does have a warning, but if you are busy looking up documentation you will probably miss the warning!

 

[Smurfatefrog]

Just don't do your return and then save it... it will be blank when you go back in

 

[Trilkop]

Impressed with SARS. Filed online on Sunday (30 June) and this morning money was in my bank account.

 

[PegZ]

How to use SARS' new eFiling system

The South African Revenue Services (SARS) has opened the 2019 tax season for taxpayers who use its digital channels - eFiling and the SARS MobiApp.

This tax season has been staggered to improve service to taxpayers and encourage conversion to online filing.

Today I tried eFiling login to do a quick scan of my details on the new site which was not exactly a success.
- It had (very) old contact details (Cell/email) on the verification page.
- You can only receive notifications by email OR cell - not both. Why not both like before?
- Once I had changed this info on the verification page and logged in (existing user/password and new OTP notification worked), I noted that there were "new" Notice/Letter indications. Shock and Horror! had I missed something during last years filing? When I opened the letter, it was from 2013!! Perhaps SARS was using old data to test with, and its still somehow active?

- On to the mobile Android App.
Despite having been updated last night, the app did not fare any better. At first it refused to login, then on retry it was unable to use the "available" data to create/load this season's form for editing. I was notified to use the website instead!

- My personal gripe.
If you are using a Linux PC, you will run into difficulties with eFiling, and will have to find a Win/Mac PC.
Why? -because SARS uses Adobe Forms (eForms?), and there's no Linux installation available from Adobe.
Last year it seemed to me that even to be successful with eFiling on a Windows PC at least, you are better off using Internet Explorer, as other browsers like Firefox or Chrome had issues.

 

[rambo919]

Yes it does timeout - it does have a warning, but if you are busy looking up documentation you will probably miss the warning!

The blinkin idiots seem to have broke more than they fixed....

 

[Napalm2880]

Today I tried eFiling login to do a quick scan of my details on the new site which was not exactly a success.
- It had (very) old contact details (Cell/email) on the verification page.
- You can only receive notifications by email OR cell - not both. Why not both like before?
- Once I had changed this info on the verification page and logged in (existing user/password and new OTP notification worked), I noted that there were "new" Notice/Letter indications. Shock and Horror! had I missed something during last years filing? When I opened the letter, it was from 2013!! Perhaps SARS was using old data to test with, and its still somehow active?

- On to the mobile Android App.
Despite having been updated last night, the app did not fare any better. At first it refused to login, then on retry it was unable to use the "available" data to create/load this season's form for editing. I was notified to use the website instead!

- My personal gripe.
If you are using a Linux PC, you will run into difficulties with eFiling, and will have to find a Win/Mac PC.
Why? -because SARS uses Adobe Forms (eForms?), and there's no Linux installation available from Adobe.
Last year it seemed to me that even to be successful with eFiling on a Windows PC at least, you are better off using Internet Explorer, as other browsers like Firefox or Chrome had issues.

Had the same issue with a notice from 2012 appearing as unread.

Also, when I reset my password, it didn't seem to like one of the special characters I used. It didn't throw any errors, I was just unable to log in with the new password. Had to reset it a second time to use "simpler" special characters.

 

[Bhabs]

I loved the fact that one can link all one's profiles into one "portfolio". The thought of loggin out from another profile to login in to another was a mystery.

 

[rambo919]

TBH it feels surreal to have efiling itself tell you that you should stop using IE.....

 

[rambo919]

OK so it uses OTP's for efiling..... won't that cause problems for e@syfile?
EDIT: nvm only needed an OTP once.... which was useless because you can set it to ANY cellphone or email address.

 

[Crusader]

Really impressed with them. Filed my return on Sunday and refund showed up today in my account. Pretty fast turnaround time.

 

[Swa]

How are they going to "crack down" on rental income? Just because you have a property or two doesn't mean you're renting it out.

 

[deweyzeph]

How are they going to "crack down" on rental income? Just because you have a property or two doesn't mean you're renting it out.

In other articles I've seen on the web, SARS said they're going to use deeds office data to weed out people who are not declaring rental income. This makes no sense whatsoever because the deeds office has absolutely nothing to do with rentals. I can't see how the deeds office is going to be able to help SARS know who is renting out their properties.

 

[jambai]

In other articles I've seen on the web, SARS said they're going to use deeds office data to weed out people who are not declaring rental income. This makes no sense whatsoever because the deeds office has absolutely nothing to do with rentals. I can't see how the deeds office is going to be able to help SARS know who is renting out their properties.

Scare tactics ... if two people declare their rent due to this deeds office tactic then it is a success . Surely looking in people’s bank accounts would be a better solution

 

[deweyzeph]

Scare tactics ... if two people declare their rent due to this deeds office tactic then it is a success . Surely looking in people’s bank accounts would be a better solution

I think a lot of people rent out properties informally on a cash basis with no formal lease. In these cases it would be almost impossible for SARS to prove that you've received any rental income short of some sort of confession from either party.

 

[Swa]

In other articles I've seen on the web, SARS said they're going to use deeds office data to weed out people who are not declaring rental income. This makes no sense whatsoever because the deeds office has absolutely nothing to do with rentals. I can't see how the deeds office is going to be able to help SARS know who is renting out their properties.

Yeah that's the part I don't get as the two does not correlate. Sure if someone has 10 properties there's the question of what they're doing with them but apart from that and doing further investigation it's not much in terms of proof. SARS is really scraping the bottom of the barrel now as they can't increase tax revenue without growing the economy.