SERVING HARD TIME FOR “SERIOUS TAX OFFENCES” – TAXPAYERS BEWARE SARS’ BOLSTERED PROSECUTION POWERS
Tax Consulting South Africa
On the frontiers of tax technical expertise & optimal compliance assurance
The Johannesburg High Court handed down an unfathomable sentence of a cumulative 205 years behind bars to a “VAT Fraud Syndicate” in April 2024! Broken down, individual sentences ranged from 5 years to 65 years, for fraudulent VAT claims from SARS, estimated at over R200 million.
As mind-boggling as the number, and sentence are, criminal convictions from SARS have been plentiful over the last few years, stemming from lifestyle audits, fraudulent return submissions, and anything else deemed a “serious tax offence”. As the average South African, you may ask yourself what qualifies as “serious”, and what other sanctions could such a conviction entail.
In short, the Tax Administration Act, 28 of 2011, defines a “serious tax offence” as below:
Criminality of Non-Compliance
In practice, a “tax offence” can take the form of any contravention of a tax act, and including the criminal offences specifically listed and in relation to taxpayer non-compliance!
This may come across as quite broad, and perhaps that is the intention as taxpayers may face fines or even imprisonment for a wide range of contraventions, including, but not limited to: