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Income Tax Individuals

Tracking ITR12 Returns from start to refund/payment in DataGrows

Written by Mariska

Managing individual tax returns can be one of the busiest and most demanding periods in an accounting practice. During tax season, firms often need to keep track of hundreds or even thousands of taxpayers, each with different sources of income, supporting documentation requirements, deadlines, and SARS interactions.

The Income Tax Individuals module in DataGrows helps firms organise, prioritise, and track these returns throughout the tax season while ensuring that important tasks, verifications, and client communications are not overlooked.

The goal is simple: give your team visibility over every return, every deadline, and every SARS interaction during tax season.

How Income Tax Individuals Are Scheduled

The Income Tax Individuals table can be found under:

Task Departments → Tax Department → Income Tax Individuals

Unlike many other services in DataGrows, the scheduling of individual tax returns is determined by SARS each year.

As soon as SARS officially announces:

  • Tax Season Opening Dates

  • Submission Deadlines

  • Provisional Taxpayer Deadlines

DataGrows schedules the applicable Income Tax tasks automatically.

This ensures your firm is always working with the latest SARS filing periods.

Activating Income Tax Individuals

To schedule Individual Income Tax Returns:

  1. Navigate to the Clients Table

  2. Open the Client Record

  3. Billing & Services tab.

  4. Check the Income Tax checkbox.

  5. Save the client.

Managing Tax Seasons

One of the biggest challenges during tax season is visibility.

Firms often need to manage:

  • Standard salary earners

  • Auto-assessed taxpayers

  • Rental property owners

  • Commission earners

  • Sole proprietors

  • Taxpayers with investment income

  • Taxpayers requiring supporting calculations

DataGrows helps centralise all of these returns in a single department for easier management.

Using Custom Workflows

Custom Workflows can be particularly valuable within the Income Tax Individuals department.

Different taxpayers often require very different documentation and processing steps.

Examples may include:

Salary Earners

  • IRP5 Review

  • Medical Verification

  • Submission

Rental Property Owners

  • Rental Income Schedule

  • Expense Verification

  • Tax Calculation

  • Submission

Commission Earners

  • Commission Statements

  • Travel Log Verification

  • Business Expense Review

  • Tax Calculation

  • Submission

Custom workflows allow your firm to tailor the process according to the complexity of the taxpayer.

Auto-Assessed vs Complex Tax Returns

Many firms choose to use Custom Workflows to distinguish between:

Auto-Assessed Taxpayers

Generally requiring:

  • Review of SARS assessment

  • Confirmation from client

  • Acceptance or correction

and

Complex Tax Returns

Often requiring:

  • Additional supporting documents

  • Reconciliations

  • Calculations

  • Enhanced review procedures

This distinction helps teams prioritise work and allocate resources more effectively during busy tax seasons.

Provisional Taxpayers

DataGrows automatically identifies provisional taxpayers who fall into the January filing cycle.

This allows firms to:

✅ Identify priority clients early

✅ Separate October and January workloads

✅ Plan resources more effectively

✅ Avoid last-minute filing pressure

This visibility is particularly valuable when managing large numbers of tax returns.

Requesting Client Information

Collecting supporting documentation is often one of the most time-consuming parts of tax season.

DataGrows includes automated email functionality that can assist with requesting:

  • Tax certificates

  • Medical certificates

  • Travel logbooks

  • Commission statements

  • Rental information

  • Investment certificates

Using these automated communications helps reduce repetitive administrative work and improves turnaround times.

Working on Tax Returns

All Income Tax Individual tasks generate reminders in:

All Tasks Due

This gives your team visibility over:

  • Upcoming deadlines

  • Outstanding returns

  • Assigned responsibilities

  • Verification requests

  • Progress status

Staff can work on tasks directly from the Income Tax Individuals table while monitoring workload through the task dashboards.

SARS Verifications

If a taxpayer is selected for verification by SARS:

  1. Open the Income Tax Individual task.

  2. Enable the SARS Verification checkbox.

  3. Save the record.

DataGrows automatically:

✅ Creates a SARS Task

✅ Generates internal reminders

✅ Schedules follow-up activities

✅ Tracks the verification separately

This helps ensure that supporting documents are submitted on time and that verification responses are not overlooked.

SARS Tasks Integration

The SARS Tasks functionality works closely with Income Tax Individuals.

When SARS requests additional information, the SARS Task can be used to:

  • Download and link correspondence from SARS to the Client

  • Track supporting documents

  • Store SARS reference numbers

  • Monitor turnaround times

  • Manage escalations where required

This creates a structured approach to managing SARS interactions throughout tax season.

Useful Filters

As tax season progresses, saved filters become increasingly important.

Examples include:

Auto-Assessed Returns

Returns requiring review only.

Verification Required

Clients selected for SARS verification.

Due This Week

Upcoming submission deadlines.

Waiting for Client Information

Outstanding documentation requests.

Assigned to Me

Personal productivity and workload management.

Saved filters allow teams to work more efficiently and focus on priority returns.

Best Practices

Enable Income Tax Services Early

Ensure all individual taxpayers are activated before tax season starts.

Use Custom Workflows

Create different workflows for different taxpayer types.

Separate Auto-Assessed Clients

This improves prioritisation and turnaround times.

Automate Information Requests

Use email templates to reduce administration.

Monitor Verifications Closely

Verification responses should be submitted promptly.

Save Useful Filters

Filters make high-volume tax season management significantly easier.

Key Takeaways

✅ Income Tax Individual tasks are automatically scheduled when SARS announces tax season deadlines.

✅ Tax services must be enabled on the Client record for reminders to be created.

✅ Custom workflows help manage different taxpayer types and levels of complexity.

✅ Provisional taxpayers due in January are automatically identified.

✅ Automated emails can assist with collecting tax documentation.

✅ SARS Verifications automatically create SARS Tasks and reminders.

✅ All tasks appear in All Tasks Due for centralised tracking.

✅ Saved filters help firms manage large tax seasons more effectively.

Remember: Successful tax season management is not just about submitting returns. It is about organising information, prioritising work, managing deadlines, and maintaining visibility across hundreds of taxpayers simultaneously. DataGrows helps bring all of those moving parts together in a single workflow. 📑✅📊

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