Case studies · Individual Tax
A R46 million SARS assessment, settled at R56 thousand.
An individual taxpayer was audited by SARS and assessed at R46 million. We re-performed the audit from the ground up, applying SARS’s own prescribed principles. The final settled liability was R56,000.
Confidential
The challenge
The assessment was R46 million. The cause was a set of activities never declared correctly.
The client had been audited by SARS, and the final findings came to R46 million. By the time we were appointed, the number had already been issued.
The root cause was not complicated. Activities had not been declared correctly, on the assumption that they did not matter. Left undeclared, they were read in the least favourable way.
Many people now carrying serious SARS debt need not be. The difference is usually governance: taking advice before acting, planning properly, and declaring the full position from the start.
Stage 1–2 · Discover and Diagnose
Every BAMML engagement starts by assessing the organisation, not by proposing a solution.
The IBPS™ looks across five domains before any recommendation is made. What it finds decides the scope.
Domains marked Primary focus set the scope of the engagement.
The IBPS™ operating model
Six stages, in order, on every engagement.
The method does not change between clients. What changes is what each stage finds. Here is what it found here.
Discover
Understand the organisation's context, objectives and challenges.
Understand the SARS findings, the basis of the R46 million assessment and the client’s circumstances.
Outputs: stakeholder interviews · document review · baseline assessment
Diagnose
Evaluate organisational capability across the five strategic domains.
Examine the structure of the individual’s affairs to establish what had actually happened, as distinct from what the assessment assumed.
Outputs: diagnostic report · capability maturity assessment · gap analysis
Design
Develop integrated strategies and practical solutions.
Plan an independent re-performance of the audit, following SARS’s prescribed principles throughout, so the result would stand on SARS’s own terms.
Outputs: strategic roadmap · governance improvements · implementation plan
Deliver
Implement agreed initiatives with clear accountability and milestones.
Re-perform the audit and present the findings. On our re-performed figures, the position pointed to a small refund.
Outputs: project plans · change support · capability development
Measure
Monitor outcomes through defined performance indicators.
The settled outcome with SARS: a final liability of R56,000, against an original assessment of R46 million.
Outputs: executive dashboards · KPI reports · Board reporting
Improve
Review lessons learned and identify opportunities for continuous improvement.
The lasting lesson is preventive: full and correct declarations, consultation before transactions, and proper planning — so an assessment like this never arises.
Outputs: improvement recommendations · updated roadmaps · governance actions
The loop closes at stage six. Every engagement ends by feeding the next one.
The outcome
Measured against where the engagement started, not against a good feeling.
Figures are the SARS assessment and the final settled outcome. Taxpayer identity withheld.
“Undeclared is not the same as unimportant. Telling the full truth is what makes proper planning possible.”
The BAMML viewBAMML INC
What made the difference
Three principles did the work.
On SARS’s own terms
The audit was re-performed using SARS’s prescribed principles, so the result could be tested, not just argued.
Structure first
We started from how the individual’s affairs were actually structured, not from the assessment’s assumptions.
Governance prevents debt
Consultation, planning and full disclosure up front cost far less than a dispute after the fact.
Talk to the person who led it
Is this your situation?
Every engagement starts the same way: a free 60-minute Health-Check that looks at your organisation across the five IBPS™ domains. You get the diagnostic whether or not you go further.
Lydia Bam
CA(SA), RA and registered Tax Practitioner; led the tax workstream on this engagement.
info@bamml.co.za · +27 65 904 5667