Almost every penalty we see could have been avoided by knowing a date. SARS penalties are largely automatic — nobody has to notice you, and nobody sends a warning first.
Here is the recurring compliance calendar for a typical South African small business. Not every item applies to every business, so work out which ones are yours and then put them in an actual calendar with a reminder.
Monthly
EMP201 — by the 7th
If you have employees, your monthly employer declaration covering PAYE, UIF and SDL is due by the 7th of the following month. Where the 7th falls on a weekend or public holiday, it moves to the last business day before.
This is the one businesses miss most, because it comes round twelve times a year and the window is short. Late submission attracts penalties and interest.
VAT201 — end of the following month
If you are VAT-registered, your VAT201 is due by the last business day of the month following the end of your tax period, provided you submit and pay through eFiling.
Most small businesses are on a two-month cycle, so you are submitting six times a year rather than twelve. Check which category you were assigned when you registered — Category A and Category B businesses have different month-ends, and people do get caught assuming their cycle matches a friend’s.
Twice a year
Provisional tax — IRP6
Provisional taxpayers — including most company directors, sole proprietors and anyone with meaningful income outside a salary — submit two provisional returns per tax year:
- First period: by the end of August
- Second period: by the end of February
The second one matters most. Underestimate your taxable income significantly and SARS can levy an underestimation penalty on top of the tax owed. This is the single most common source of unpleasant February surprises, and it is entirely avoidable if your books are current enough to make a realistic estimate.
An optional third “top-up” payment is available later for anyone who wants to limit interest.
EMP501 — employer reconciliation
Employers reconcile their payroll declarations twice a year:
- Interim reconciliation: covering March to August, submitted around September/October
- Annual reconciliation: covering the full tax year, submitted around April/May
This is where IRP5 certificates are generated for your staff. Get it wrong and your employees cannot file their own returns properly — which makes it very visible, very quickly.
SARS confirms the exact submission windows each year, so check the current dates rather than assuming.
Annually
Personal income tax return — ITR12
Filing season opens around July each year. Broadly:
- Non-provisional individual taxpayers: usually until late October
- Provisional taxpayers and trusts: usually until January of the following year
SARS publishes the exact dates annually. Auto-assessments have made this smoother for salaried taxpayers, but do not treat an auto-assessment as automatically correct — if you have deductions SARS does not know about, such as home office expenses or retirement annuity contributions, you need to file properly.
Company income tax return — IT14
Companies file within 12 months of their financial year-end. If your year-end is February, the return is due by the following February.
Twelve months sounds generous. It disappears remarkably fast when the books still need finalising.
CIPC annual return
Separate from SARS, and frequently forgotten. Every registered company and close corporation must file an annual return with CIPC within 30 business days of the anniversary of its incorporation date.
Miss it repeatedly and CIPC begins deregistration proceedings. A deregistered company cannot legally trade, and its bank accounts can be frozen. Reinstatement is possible but slow and irritating.
Note the trigger: it is your incorporation anniversary, not your financial year-end. People conflate the two constantly.
COIDA return of earnings
Businesses with employees must submit an annual return of earnings to the Compensation Fund. The submission window generally opens around April, with the deadline commonly extended.
Staying current here is what gets you a Letter of Good Standing — which many clients, especially larger corporates and government tenders, will insist on before they contract with you.
A practical way to handle all this
- Write down which of these actually apply to you. Most small businesses have three or four, not all nine.
- Put every one in a calendar with a reminder a week ahead, not on the day. A week gives you time to fix a problem; the day itself does not.
- Work backwards from the deadline. If VAT201 is due end of the following month, the bookkeeping needs to be done by the middle of it.
- Never let a period close before it is reconciled. Almost every scramble starts with books that were a month behind before the deadline was even in sight.
When you are already behind
If some of these have slipped, the important thing is that it is fixable and extremely common. Penalties accrue while you do nothing, so the sooner it is dealt with the smaller it stays.
The usual sequence is: work out exactly what is outstanding, get the books current enough to submit accurately, file the missing returns, then address penalties with SARS once you are compliant again. It is rarely as bad as the anxiety around it suggests.
Dates and thresholds in this article reflect general South African practice at the time of writing. SARS and CIPC publish exact dates each year — always check the current ones, or ask us. This is general information, not tax advice for your specific circumstances.
Want someone else watching this calendar? That is precisely what we do. See our services or book a free call.