Donations, what SARS needs to know

• Are you making donations to your children?
• Did you make a donation to a third party, that is not a registered NGO/NPO?
• Did you write off a loan to another person, a trust or a company?

Donations are an illusive thing. Our generosity deserves some kudos, be it only when we get to heaven, but donations are such an important part of our South African economy and keep people alive. The desire to be generous and help those in need is dwindling in our society. A huge dependency and expectation has been placed on Government to support and donate the masses, where previously a number of these projects were also supported by churches, trusts, companies and private individuals. South Africans need to think about what the future holds for all of us in the country and how we can all be generous to build a prosperous nation. To those that are already doing this, a Big Thank You.

Why would I need to report this good deed to SARS?

There are certain tax implications that result from donations. To keep it simple, if you donate:

• less than R100,000 per annum in your private capacity; or
• less than R10,000 for companies; or
• less than 10% of taxable income from companies to Public Benefit Organisations

then there is no tax payable. We still advise submission of the IT144 to SARS, so as not to create any confusion as to when donations have been made. Use the SARS Donations Form IT144 to submit the donation figures to SARS. The submission process is still manual, but we look forward to this being an online Efiling process in the future.

So if you donate funds to your children every year, remember to fill out the IT144 form. This will assist with your estate and tax planning.