Purpose  

SARS Relationship Management is responsible for the coordination and facilitation of all interactions between large business taxpayers and relevant functions across SARS.   

Mandate

To strengthen and manage relations with its taxpayers through operational effectiveness and service excellence as well as to improve the compliance culture.

Relationship Management Team

Relationship Management has a dedicated team who are the primary contact for all large taxpayers. 
The offices are located primarily at Johannesburg (Megawatt Park), Durban, Cape Town and Port Elizabeth.

Classification of Groups for Relationship Management

The structure is organised into three major economic groups, which represent the nine Standard Industry Classification codes, namely:

• Primary Cluster (Mining and Quarrying; Forestry and Fishing; Agriculture).
• Secondary Cluster (Manufacturing; Electricity gas and water supply, Construction, Wholesale and retail trade).
• Tertiary Cluster (Transport, storage and communication, Financial intermediation, real estate and business services; Community, social and personal services).

Each cluster has the following dedicated personnel:

• Senior Manager has the overall responsibility for the operations of the cluster.
• Specialists are responsible to manage relationships with a portfolio of taxpayers.
• Operations Managers are responsible for the query resolution process and management of the Consultants and Service Agents.
• Consultants are responsible to resolve taxpayer service queries and they serve as primary points of contact.
• Administrators support the team on administrative issues including the issuing of Tax Compliance Status. 

Key activities of Relationship Management 

The responsibility of Relationship Management is to assist taxpayers to comply with their statutory obligations in the most efficient and effective manner through the delivery of a superior and differentiated service and educating taxpayers.

The single point of contact for the taxpayer facilitates a more efficient service and permits regular interaction with a view to:

• Obtaining a better understanding of the taxpayer’s business and the risk factors affecting compliance.
• Informing taxpayers of any system/process developments and the impact thereof.
• Discussing the progress of any current issues/disputes with SARS.
• Planning the logistics of field audits.
• Holding regular taxpayer education interventions with a view to alerting taxpayers to the implications of SARS modernisation agenda initiatives.
• Providing taxpayers with training on eFiling/e@syFile and other SARS systems as well as facilitating the effective use of these systems.
• Alerting taxpayers to new systems/processes introduced by SARS.
• Improving voluntary tax compliance. 

Query resolution for Large Business

The centralised email address for submission of Large Business taxpayer queries is lbqueries@sars.gov.za. 

A Consultant or Service Agent will acknowledge receipt of requests within 2 (two) working days. However, should requests relate to an application for a Tax Clearance Certificate, the request will be acknowledged within 24 (twenty four) hours.

The standard turnaround time for all service requests is 21 (twenty one) business days & 5 (five) business days for tax clearance certificates.    For ‘High Net Worth Individuals’ (HNWI) queries, you may email hnwiqueries@sars.gov.za. 

Escalation process for Large Business 

• The query resolution mailbox must be the first point of contact for all queries.
• Should the service issues not be resolved at the query resolution process (within the given timeframes), the taxpayer may escalate the issue to lbqueries@sars.gov.za. 
• A valid case number must be provided when escalating a matter.  The case number would have been provided in the initial query resolution process.
• Should the above process not be followed or a valid case number not be provided, the escalation will be routed to the LB queries mailbox for consideration.
• A Consultant or Service Agent will acknowledge receipt of the escalation within 2 working days.
• If the escalation process fails to resolve your concern and you wish to register a complaint and take the matter further then please follow the Complaint Management Process.
• In all cases it is essential that all the steps indicated above are adhered to for escalations, otherwise you will be referred to the relevant previous step in the process.