Tax and SARS knowledge base
How must a medical scheme submit contribution data to SARS?
What controls should a medical scheme apply when submitting member contribution data to SARS?
Last reviewed:
Direct answer
A medical scheme must submit prescribed third-party data for the relevant reporting period using an approved SARS channel and the current medical-scheme business requirements specification. The reporting population, member and dependant details, contribution amounts and identifiers must agree to the scheme's administration records.
The scheme, not the member, is responsible for correcting incorrect source data that later prepopulates an ITR12.
What this means in practice
Reconcile employer-paid, member-paid and other contribution sources so that the same amount is not counted twice. Treat membership changes and dependant dates as data-quality events.
Run exception reports for missing tax numbers, identity mismatches, negative values and overlapping membership periods before building the submission.
Step-by-step
- Confirm the reporting period and current specification.
- Extract active and terminated membership data for the full period.
- Reconcile contributions to the scheme's financial and administration systems.
- Validate member, dependant and payer identifiers.
- Create and validate the submission file.
- Submit through the enrolled channel.
- Resolve rejected records and reconcile accepted totals.
- Issue corrected certificates or member communications where necessary.
Documents and records to keep
- Membership and dependant history.
- Contribution ledger reconciliation.
- Submission file and control totals.
- SARS responses and rejection log.
- Correction and member-notification evidence.
Important limits and exceptions
This reporting obligation is separate from whether an individual ultimately qualifies for a medical tax credit.
Do not ask a member to overwrite locked source data. Correct the scheme submission where the scheme's information is wrong.
When to get tailored advice
Get help for mergers, administrator changes, backdated dependants, employer-group reallocations or unreconciled contribution totals.