Caseware Africa launches Trust Tax

Caseware Africa, part of the Adapt IT group, has launched a holistic, cloud-based tax return solution designed especially for trusts. Michael Mncube, Tax Product Manager at Caseware Africa, says that the new software enables tax practitioners to handle all tax administrative matters relating to trusts in one application, including the preparation, calculation, and submission of IRP6 and ITR12T tax returns directly to SARS.

“Administering trusts is complex and the tax authorities are especially rigorous in their oversight of trusts, thus further raising the stakes for administrators. Trust Tax provides practitioners with a single application that makes it possible to keep track of all trustees and beneficiaries, as well as managing all trust administration and tax-related matters,” he says.

“In the age of remote work, practitioners are enabled with greater flexibility as Trust Tax is offered via Caseware Cloud, which means it is available from any location, on any device, at any time.”

Trust Tax is also included with Caseware CloudTax, a tax management platform that provides tax practitioners with an invaluable overview of their entire client base, and corporate tax teams with a unified view of all tax return-related matters for all their taxpayers. It integrates directly with SARS e-filing.

“The cloud offers many time-saving features that will help users get more done faster. Of particular importance in Trust Tax, is the ability to collaborate directly with taxpayers in the app to assemble supporting documentation, as well as maintaining a single copy of all taxpayer records to preserve data integrity,” he says. Other important features include the ability to manage and monitor deadlines, and a full suite of checklists, questionnaires, and schedules that intelligently expand or collapse according to the complexity of the return. Trust Tax also automatically links to the latest SARS forms and calculation frameworks, so all returns are automatically compliant.

“Trust Tax will greatly help to optimise efficiency for tax practitioners in a complex area of tax administration. Like all CaseWare products, it is designed to help practitioners use their time more effectively while enhancing the service they deliver to clients. What we are especially excited about is that with the introduction of Trust Tax, practitioners can now, when combined with both Corporate Tax and Individual Tax, manage all their provisional and annual tax returns for all their clients on a single cloud platform.” Mr Mncube concludes.

The Remote Tax Practice: Make It Happen With Caseware CloudTax

Caseware CloudTax helps tax practitioners solve many of today’s challenges and lays the foundation for the tax practice of the future.

In the age of lockdowns and working from home, both practitioners and their clients find themselves having to run their businesses remotely. Many tax practices experienced revenue losses when the initial lockdowns were introduced. Others have been victims of cyber-attacks and ransomware. At the same time, SARS also increased auto-assessments to grow collection revenues, which has introduced additional challenges for practitioners to ensure assessments contain appropriate information.

One thing has become clear: there is a burning need for tax practitioners to effectively manage data and client information, to find better ways of assisting their clients from any location, whilst continuing to ensure that their clients’ tax affairs remain in order.

Covid-19 has certainly reemphasized the urgency for tax practices to future proof their firms. There’s no doubt that smart tax practices have already seen the writing on the wall and are looking to transition to cloud-based solutions. Research shows that this is where future-fit accountants still have considerable room to grow, with less than 20% of accountants using tax-preparation software, whilst the rest are still managing their practices using manual processes.

But moving to tax-preparation software is only the beginning. Whilst preparing the tax return is the final deliverable, it must be recognised that it is the result of a process that starts much earlier.

In fact, most taxpayers spend between 75% to 90% of their time gathering information and documents. As anyone who has done it knows, it’s daunting to collaborate with clients via the phone or e-mail, and response times can often be very long. Another major issue is the use of spreadsheets to calculate and check numbers – an approach that introduces errors and that is time-consuming. It also means that the information is all over the place, wherever people are working on it—instead of in one central location where everybody can access it.

In addition, when information is dispersed, version control becomes a continuing and difficult issue to manage. And, of course, there is the time-consuming and inefficient process of submitting each tax return manually.

Caseware Africa Offers A Solution For Tax Practitioners

Tax practitioners who transition to cloud-based solutions can quickly overcome previous challenges and take advantage of significant benefits. For one thing, moving to a cloud-based solution means that the firm is always assured of using the latest technology—without the upfront capital costs of acquiring a licence every time a product is upgraded or needing to roll out upgrades to every user.

Some of the main benefits of moving to the cloud are:

  • Better cost model. Costs are predictable and easy to manage, and practitioners do not need to invest in server and security infrastructure. This introduces considerable savings.
  • Better security. Data is stored safely and securely on multiple remote servers, without needing any resources or costs from the practitioner to maintain. The firm’s data, and that of its clients, is much more secure—no small thing given the Protection of Personal Information Act (PoPIA) and its stringent penalties.
  • Accessibility. Tax practices and their teams can work from anywhere at any time, and all they need is a browser and access to the internet. This means that firms can save costs on VPN connections and do not need to coordinate software update installations with their IT teams.
  • Centralised storage. Clients don’t have to struggle with managing multiple copies of the same information in different places. In addition, the cloud offers unlimited storage space and comes with useful features like automatic backup, so practitioners don’t have to worry about losing or redoing any work.
  • Enhanced productivity. Greater security is complemented by greater availability. Centrally located data is accessible to all who need it, from wherever they are. Tax professionals can service their clients from wherever they happen to be and do not need to be in their offices to do so. Another big advantage is that any number of tax professionals can work on the same documents simultaneously.

Why Tax Practices Need Caseware CloudTax

Adopting CloudTax is a great starting point for the move to the cloud because it has been specifically designed with the needs of the tax practitioner in mind. CloudTax enables tax professionals to access all the benefits of the cloud while minimising the risks. Some of the main benefits are:

  • Easy collaboration with clients. Practitioners can make use of built-in queries and customisable questionnaires and send those to clients directly from within the app. Clients then respond easily by logging into their personal portal, answering the questions, and uploading any necessary documents—even via smartphone. The system notifies the tax professional when new information is provided.
  • Deadline Management. CloudTax keeps track of important deadlines and users can easily monitor provisional and annual return progress and status for all their entities.
  • SARS Integration. CloudTax integrates directly with SARS eFiling, which means practitioners can process all taxpayer details, correspondence, and tax return submissions automatically in bulk.
  • SARS Compliance. Tax return forms and calculation frameworks are frequently kept up to date to ensure that they are compliant with all relevant tax legislation, greatly simplifying the tax return process.
  • Seamless Data Integration. Trial balance information can easily and automatically be imported from Caseware Working Papers, Xero, QuickBooks, and Excel to pre-populate tax returns.
  • Optimisation. Checklists, questionnaires, and schedules are built-in that intelligently expand or collapse according to the complexity of the return.
  • Prepare, calculate, and submit tax returns directly to SARS eFiling. CloudTax supports Provisional (IRP6), Individual (ITR12), Corporate (ITR14), and Trust (ITR12T) tax returns with built-in calculations aligned to SARS.
  • With CloudTax, tax practitioners are now more empowered than ever with a holistic cloud-based tax return solution, that can be used seamlessly for all provisional and annual returns for Corporates, Individuals, and Trusts. The tax practice of the future will be cloud-based. With CloudTax, tax practitioners can take a very meaningful step towards setting up their firms for future success.

Corporate Tax Software Solution

Improving Tax Efficiency Through Automation

Michael Mncube, Tax Product Manager at Caseware Africa, a division of Adapt IT, elaborates on corporate tax challenges and how automation can improve efficiency.

The Income Tax Act requires all businesses liable to taxation to register with SARS as taxpayers. This comes with income tax return submissions which must be done 12 months after the tax year-end. In addition to annual income tax returns, every company is required to submit provisional tax returns.

The Challenges For Corporate Tax

Timelines

Timelines are unquestionably important in the whole process of tax return submissions. All tax practitioners concur that taxes and timelines go hand in hand: missing such deadlines incurs additional penalties coupled with interest. All of these add up to additional costs added to clients’ bills. Time definitely costs money in the tax world.

Given that legislation allows for companies to select their own year-end dates, there is a high probability that a single tax practitioner will have a portfolio of clients with different year-end dates. For a single tax client, the tax practitioner needs to be cognisant of four dates: the first; second; and possibly, the third provisional tax, as well as the annual income tax return due dates. Imagine having a large portfolio of tax clients and all with different tax year-ends – now that is a nightmare guaranteed to keep a tax practitioner awake at night.

Provisional Taxes

Provisional tax is not a separate tax from income tax but a method of paying the income tax liability in advance, to ensure that taxpayers do not have huge tax debts on assessment. This is done through the submission of an IRP6 Provisional Tax Return. Provisional tax allows the tax liability to be spread over the relevant year of assessment. Taxpayers are required to pay at least two amounts, based on estimated taxable income, in advance during the year of assessment. A third payment is optional after the end of the tax year but before the issuing of the assessment by SARS. On assessment, the provisional payments will be offset against the liability for normal tax for the applicable year of assessment. Issues normally arise when estimating taxable income, as when this is incorrectly done it might result in penalties being imposed by SARS.

Corporate Income Taxes

Corporate income tax is a tax imposed on companies resident in the Republic of South Africa (i.e. incorporated under the laws of, or effectively managed in, South Africa and that derive income from within or outside the Republic). Non-resident companies that operate through a branch or that have a permanent establishment in South Africa are subject to tax on all income from a source within the Republic. Payment of such taxes is through the submission of an ITR14 income tax return. This return comes with its challenges.

If gross income as disclosed on the first page of the ITR14 tax return does not agree with the aggregate total revenue and total other income as disclosed in the income statement section, the ITR14 will not print or cannot be submitted.

Getting the right number in the right box of the ITR14 tax return is a challenge and consumes a bit of time. Take gross income for instance, which comes from three different fields in the Statement of Comprehensive Income (Income Statement) namely adding Revenue to Investment and Other Income.

For the Asset section of the ITR14 tax return, splitting the non-current assets section is also a hassle. The numbers are not disclosed on the same page of the Statement of Financial Position (Balance Sheet): this must be unpacked from both the face of the balance sheet and the property, plant, and equipment note.

These processes are daunting and time-consuming. Getting this wrong poses, a risk for tax practitioners as there might be reviews or audits imposed by SARS, meaning further time investment and costs to the taxpayers.

Penalties And Interests

Earlier this year SARS announced the implementation of administrative penalties on companies that do not comply with the requirement of submitting their tax returns. The penalties range from R250 to R16 000 per month that non-compliance continues, depending on a company’s assessed loss or taxable income.

With the possibility of penalties, there is now a more stringent requirement to stick to tax return submission deadlines in order to avoid such penalties and interest.

The Corporate Tax Software Solution

Caseware Africa offers the optimal corporate tax software solution. Automating your business practices will save you both time and money. Your administrative time will be reduced. Automation can avoid costly mistakes and disputes with SARS by ‘getting it right the first time’.

With automation, tax practitioners will position themselves as strategic advisers. They will move into advisory roles and away from the traditional administrative role. One of the ways technology can create efficiencies is when tax practitioners make use of automated systems to submit their income tax returns.

Automated tax software solutions, such as CloudTax offered by Adapt IT – Caseware Africa, can automate the income tax submission process. This process is usually done manually by tax practitioners and takes a lot of time.

CloudTax is an automated cloud software that allows tax practitioners to store historical tax returns in the cloud, synchronise SARS correspondences and letters, track the work done by multiple professionals on a company’s returns, and create provisional tax returns 60 days before a deadline imposed by the tax authority.

Keeping a manual diary of deadlines is a thing of the past: CloudTax notifies you of all tax deadlines (income tax and provisional tax) 60 days before due dates and keeps track of such until returns are submitted through a single dashboard.

The aim with CloudTax is to save tax practitioners time and ultimately money, over and above minimising errors if not actually eliminating them completely.

CloudTax comes with an ITR14 tax return solution, the Corporate Tax Product which has automated integration with SARS synching. Populating the ITR14 has never been this easy. Using the solution puts the right number in the right box. The ITR14 is pre-populated through automated integration with Caseware Working Papers. CloudTax also incorporates flexible integration with Xero, QuickBooks, and Excel. Through automation, completing the ITR14 has been reduced to only seven simple steps.

Contact Caseware Africa to set up a free demo

Caseware Africa launches Cloud – Individual Tax

Caseware Africa, a division of Adapt IT, has released details of its latest innovation, Individual Tax. This additional app on the CloudTax platform facilitates the preparation, calculation, and submission of individual tax returns (ITR12).

“It is estimated that the majority of tax practitioners spend between 75% to 90% of their time gathering information and documents in preparation of tax returns”, says Michael Mncube, Tax Product Manager, Caseware Africa .“This together with ensuring that accurate, high-quality tax returns are submitted to SARS on time, often leaves very little room to optimise the efficiency of the methodology and improve the process that the practice follows.”

Mncube says gathering tax data using hard copies, client collaboration via countless emails and phone calls, is both tedious and daunting. “This entire process results in long and delayed response times. The use of Excel spreadsheets to calculate and corroborate numbers, a multitude of disconnected datasets used by tax teams, plus the resulting errors, are all compounded when needing to submit each tax return, per taxpayer individually as well – leading to an inefficient and time consuming process,” he says.

“Individual Tax offers unsurpassed efficiencies as the collection of tax data for specific tax years is achieved via digital queries that then automatically store the information in the relevant sections of the return – saving significant time and effort” notes Mncube. Individual Tax offers a centralised data storage in a single format, a comprehensive tax calculation framework aligned to SARS, powerful overviews of tax-related balances and the ability to prepare both IRP6 and ITR12 returns in a single solution. “This new addition to our CloudTax suite offers a multitude of benefits including the presentation of a clear view of provisional and income tax returns, together with related values grouped per tax year – all a single view allowing reconciliations of submissions and assessments.”
Additional features include built-in schedules that facilitate the summary of tax data inputs and auto-calculation of totals, thus, eliminating human error. “It also caters for bulk submission of tax returns to SARS, saving additional time and further enhancing efficiency. Seamless annual updates empower practitioners with peace of mind by ensuring that the latest changes in tax legislation and compliance are incorporated,” says Mncube.

CloudTax integrates directly with SARS efiling, which automatically synchronises all taxpayer details and historical correspondence in bulk, into a one-stop centralised location for fast and easy access. Built-in dashboards ensure that deadlines are never missed and that efforts can be directed to the most urgent action items. “By managing all client contact information in one place, practitioners can collaborate directly with taxpayers from within the platform.

“Powered by Caseware Cloud, CloudTax is always available from any location, on any device, at any time and is included when customers buy Individual Tax,” Mncube concludes.

A Simple Way To Manage The Complexities Of Corporate Tax

Ideal for both practice and business clients, the corporate tax product integrates with the global, leading, financial reporting templates on Caseware Working Papers. It may also be used as an independent taxation solution and it offers a simple way to manage the complexities of tax. You are able to import a trial balance from Xero, Quickbooks, or Excel to prepopulate your tax return. Importing a trial balance directly from your financial statement solution means that preparing an ITR14 tax return is both quick and easy.

Easy-To-Use Features Of Corporate Tax

Using an easy-to-follow workflow, producing tax computations and SARS forms is simple as the software walks you through the complete process step by step. Each individual area of tax legislation has its own schedule, which can easily be reviewed and amended by the tax team, with each schedule linked to the computation and form.
 
 
The software also includes comprehensive data verification and balance checks so you never miss an adjustment or a review point when compiling your  ITR14 tax return. Reviewing is easy, as a summary of all errors is presented on a single view prior to sign-off and submission to SARS.

Simple Tax Returns

Caseware’s corporate tax product includes a comprehensive tax calculation framework that aligns with SARS. This is automatically selected based on the entity type, triggered by revenue amounts for micro, small, and medium to large entity types. With all entity types, the calculator provides a comprehensive list of allowances so you do not miss those important deductions. With an automated workflow, it is easier for the user to prepare and file the ITR14 tax return.

In addition to the latest tax codes and updated ITR14 tax forms, Caseware’s corporate tax product includes a comprehensive help menu and electronic document management system allowing you to add supplementary evidence.

Once your return is completed, submission is simple through the Caseware Cloud Service with a full tracking and monitoring dashboard.

Find out more about corporate tax and the immense features and benefits it holds for your business. Should you have any queries, feel free to contact Caseware Africa, an Adapt IT company and leader in financial reporting solutions.

Technology offers tax professionals a powerful tool that will improve their services to clients

The power of automation and visualisation and how it empowers you – the tax practitioner!

Charl Geldenhuys explains why technology can simplify life for tax practitioners—and make you more effective into the bargain.

The onward march of technology can be a challenge all of us. Technology can open up a previously settled market to newcomers and disrupt established practices where, in extreme cases, previously profitable companies could find themselves irrelevant.

At an individual level, professionals can also feel threatened as increasingly sophisticated technologies—think artificial intelligence and machine learning—appear to be encroaching on their competencies.

 

Whilst they are real – these threats are also significantly hyped up by a media that thrives on sensational headlines. In reality, technology offers tax professionals a powerful tool that will improve their services to clients while significantly enhancing the efficiency of their own working practices.  This is achieved by reducing the need for manual, time-consuming and tedious processes and freeing up time for more value added offerings.

One example is the growing sophistication of cloud-based solutions to help you manage your client base much more easily and effectively. Harnessing the power of automation and visualisation streamlines the difficult and time-consuming administrative task of managing a large number of tax returns from inception through to submission to SARS.

It seems deceptively simple, but it’s always been something of a nightmare for tax practitioners: how do you keep track of where each one of your clients’ tax returns is in the process, year after year?

There’s a lot riding on this, as tax authorities are very ready to impose penalties, and clients’ trust you to handle their entire affairs. You need a way not only to see where each return is in the process, but also to obtain a bird’s eye view of all the returns allowing problem areas to be flagged and omissions identified before they become material.

The dreaded spreadsheet

Until fairly recently, the best option was the spreadsheet, which over the years has been forced into a number of roles for which it was never designed. In this instance, it has to be admitted that spreadsheets are not ideal tracking tools. Firstly, a great deal of manual input is required and subsequent maintenance of changes to data has to be meticulously and manually logged. This is also a very time-consuming process, manual data capturing and maintenance, combined with inevitable user error are notoriously risky processes and almost guarantee the introduction of mistakes into data sets.

Another huge disadvantage of a spreadsheet is that it remains tabular, and thus a less-than-ideal way to get a handle on the elusive “big picture”.

So what’s the answer?

Modern, cloud-based technology! It enables you to see all clients with the status of their return shown graphically, through an interactive dashboard. CaseWare’s CloudTax product is an example of an application that allows tax practitioners to view: all active taxpayers; client status; returns due, as well as missing information.  What is even better is the fact that this application then allows you to drill down into each of the categories to see the detail and take the appropriate remedial action. These visualisations – and there many different kinds you could use – are very useful in allowing a tax practitioner to toggle between a comprehensive big-picture view and the detail of a particular client’s tax file.

But the cherry on the cake is to link this visualisation capability with automation. In our example, this means linking the tax management application into the SARS e-filing system. This will show: all the submissions not yet sent to SARS; queries and requests already submitted to SARS; returns that have been successfully filed; all the correspondence with SARS, and more. The integration is controlled by a sync function that assimilates the details of the tax practitioner’s clients with SARS e-filing.

Automation and visualisation—a winning combination that will enable you to manage multiple client returns more effectively while freeing up time to provide a more strategic advisory and planning function to clients on their respective tax affairs.

Now you have to agree that’s progress!

Caseware Africa launches CloudTax: powerful new solution for tax practitioners

Caseware Africa, a division of Adapt IT, has launched CloudTax, a powerful new product aimed at small, medium and large tax practices.

CloudTax provides tax practitioners with a central place to manage their entire practice which integrates seamlessly with SARS eFiling, says Katharine Janisch, Head of Sales and Marketing at Caseware Africa.”Initially, we have focused on provisional tax returns, but corporate and individual return capabilities are being developed in time for clients with December year ends and the opening of the 2018 individual tax season in July 2018. This powerful product enables companies to gain complete control through full visibility of their tax practice. It facilitates tracking the status of every return for every client at the right time and from one central dashboard. Practitioners can view correspondence from SARS and clients from a single platform without logging into eFiling,” says Janisch.She highlights CloudTax’s delivery of improved productivity and profitability yields. “The product essentially eliminates as many previously manual processes as possible and in doing so, saves time and enables practitioners to focus on giving their clients advice rather than just number crunching for them. Moreover, CloudTax seamlessly integrates with the financial reporting solution Caseware Working Papers, meaning that practitioners will never again have to recapture financial data to populate a return, nor will they have to search for information relating to any client, it is right at their fingertips. Automatically triggered workflows display where you are with every client at any time,” she notes.CloudTax also enables practitioners to track all client and SARS correspondence giving them the ability to respond timeously. Janisch says, simply put – CloudTax enables tax practitioners to improve their client services and position themselves in a consulting/advisory capacity through the automation of processes that would otherwise detract from their time and focus. “One of the most exciting prospects for practitioners using CloudTax is that they will never again worry about missing a deadline – now that is a major benefit for this business sector. Even more exciting is that this solution is affordably priced for even the smallest tax practice, while providing the scalability and depth required by some of the largest tax practices in the industry,” concludes Janisch

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