Archive for year: 2020

The European (and South African) authorities (refer to governance codes below) opted for a principles-based approach. However, governance cannot be truly effective without the integrity of purpose and actions which drive the ‘tone from the top’ leading to a strong moral compass founded on ethically-based values.

The governance imperative

Corporate Governance has been a topic of ongoing conversation and even legislation since the early 1990’s. However, in spite of a number of outstanding codes and reports (such as the Cadbury Report, the four King Codes and Reports, the Combined Code and many more around the world), together with the various legislative responses (such as Sarbanes Oxley in the USA), business failures continue.

Where were the directors of these failed businesses and what were they looking at and asking of management when considering their approval of the financial statements year after year?

Ethics and moral duties

Each director is a steward of the company and should demonstrate:

• Conscience – intellectual honesty and independence of mind,
• Inclusivity – legitimate interests and expectations of stakeholders,
• Competence – knowledge and skills
• Commitment – diligence, and
• Courage – to take the appropriate risks and to act with integrity.

There is evidence that suggests that companies displaying consistent ethical values and behaviours based on solid and sustainable moral values driven throughout the organisation where all are aligned to the ‘tone from the top’ deliver better and more sustainable returns.

The ethical and moral imperative

Key questions:

• Is it a reasonable presumption that all know and fully understand the meaning and impact of ethical behaviour, moral values and what drives them?
• Do the directors live out their stated ethical and moral values – the tone from the top?
• What are the views of management and the workforce of the leadership’s (director’s) ethical and moral values and the example set?
• Is it reasonable to assume that management knows how to embed these values throughout the organisation?
• How do directors measure the ethical and moral climate of their organisation?
• Does the ethical and moral climate of the organisation align with those espoused by the directors?

What is understood by ethics and morals – is there a universal standard, a universal moral compass? 

In the Glossary of terms in the King IV report the term Ethics is defined as follows:

“Considering what is good and right for the self and the other, and can be expressed in terms of the golden rule, namely to treat others as you would like to be treated yourself. In the context of organisations, ethics refers to ethical values applied to decision-making, conduct, and the relationship between the organisation, its stakeholders and the broader society”.

However, what is understood by ethical values, behaviours and integrity? Can one assert that there is a set of Universal Principles? Consider the following:

Universal Principles

Noted anthropologist Donald E Brown found in his research that the moral codes of all cultures include recognition of responsibility, reciprocity, and ability to empathise. Other studies have confirmed his findings. The major world religions preach common values: commitment to something greater than self, responsibility, respect, and caring for others. Genuine behaviour norms in different cultures may distract us from what we have in common with all people – a universal moral compass.  

Stephen Covey suggests more evidence of universal principles: “From my experience in working with different people and cultures, I find that if certain conditions are present when people are challenged to develop a value system; they will identify essentially the same values. Each culture may express those values differently, but the underlying moral sense is always the same.”

What are these universal moral values?

The authors of Moral Intelligence (Doug Lennick and Fred Kiel, Ph. D) suggest the following from their research:

• Integrity
  
• Responsibility
• Compassion
• Forgiveness and reconciliation

While the first two seem self-explanatory, what about the last two?

Compassion shown to an employee in distress may lead not only to a swifter recovery and return to full operational ability but also to a substantial gain in loyalty from employees – and not just to the employee concerned.

Forgiveness and reconciliation: Is not business the enterprise of risk?  If employees and management are too fearful of making mistakes, how much business risk are they likely to take?

Finally, an organisation that demonstrates these ‘universal values’ from the top through management in alignment with actual behaviour will achieve, through its workforce, greater returns than might otherwise be the case.

So, these ‘soft’ practices have the potential of leading to hard bottom line results.

Ethics and moral values – are they worth it?

It has been suggested that companies with recognised good governance are valued at a premium over those with poor governance records. The same applies to companies with sound ethical records. Ethical companies attract and retain talent.

The Proposition

• Enhanced governance through demonstrated ethical behaviour
  • What are your values and ethics?
  • Does your behaviour reflect them?
  • How do your board colleagues and your first line reports perceive your values, ethics, and integrity?
  • What is your staff’s perception?
  • How do you go about ensuring the values are embedded throughout the organisation to achieve alignment?
• Starts at the top
• Safety for those really tough and necessary conversations
• Ethics led performance
• Behavioural change and feedback
• Strong business case
• Is your top team up for the challenge?

“Communication is a skill that you can learn. It’s like riding a bicycle or typing. If you’re willing to work at it, you can rapidly improve the quality of every part of your life.” (American business speaker Brian Tracy)

Successful communication can be the difference between a profitable business and a failing one. Leaders who are unable to get across the needs of the company to their employees will very quickly close its doors. Likewise, people who are effectively able to communicate the things they need to be done will find their reward in a harmonious team and profitable enterprise.

This article is for those people who believe themselves to be among the latter. Those who have managed to traverse the minefield of communication and who find themselves surrounded by a largely effective team. In this position, it is possible you may still be making communication errors that are chipping away at your profitability and leading to a team that isn’t as effective as it possibly could be. They are common errors that anyone could make and everyone has seen at some point, but they definitely impact the bottom line. Here is how to cut them out and take your company to a brand-new level.

Avoid these communication errors

1. Not answering the questionNo matter how well you explain things, being a leader sometimes requires you to answer follow-up questions from your team. While most of the time these questions are simple enough to answer, there may be occasions in which a manager may not be able to answer the question. Perhaps they don’t know the answer or simply didn’t take time to understand the question or misunderstood the question.

   When it comes to the effectiveness of your employee who is asking the question though, purposefully avoiding a response is as bad as mistakenly answering it incorrectly or ambiguously.

   For example, imagine your employee has sent you an email asking, “Did you say you wanted that report today, or next week?”

   A distracted communicator may see the first half of the message and rush to reply “Absolutely” or “Yes.” This ambiguous reply now wastes time and further confuses the employee. Does this mean the deadline has been pushed out or that it’s still due today? The employee may then be forced to follow up, or worse, assume an extension has been granted when it has not. Either situation wastes that employee’s time and can even lose a client.

   Avoid this simple error by ensuring you automatically read the full email and understand it before responding. Then make sure you make it clear which answer is to which question. Don’t assume the employee will be able to infer what is meant each step of the way.

2. Too much informationThere is a very clear difference between providing your employee with the context and information they need to do their jobs and live up to expectations and giving them too much information. Giving an order with the right amount of information and the proper context will save time and make that employee better at their job.

   This error creeps in due to the manager’s assumption either that the employee needs more information than they do, or that extra information will help them to contextualize and make their own decisions. In the worst-case scenarios, it comes from the manager themselves not being sure what information the employee needs and simply giving them everything in the hope that this may cover it.

   The problem here is that having too much information can lead to time-wasting and analysis paralysis.

   For example, why share all the product information with your sales rep, when at the end of the day there are only three key points that separate your product from the competition and help to make the sale? Sending your sales reps a manual and expecting them to work out for themselves what aspects of your product will help them sell it to clients is as unhelpful as giving them no information at all. The time they waste reading the manual could rather be spent perfecting their sales techniques or working on their pitch documents.

   This also extends to bombarding your employees with opinions or reasoning that they may not need. Sometimes, in order to err on the side of caution, or to seem smarter than they need to be, managers can lean towards being verbose. As a manager you should avoid sending long paragraphs or speeches packed with thoughts, reasoning and explanations when a simple email explaining what needs to be done will remove wasted time and confusion.

   At the end of the day, conciseness is the key to good communication. Managers who impart all the necessary information and no more will find their teams perform more effectively and more profitably.

3. Too little contextJust as bad as too much information is when managers share information assuming the context is known by everyone in the organisation. Context gives meaning to orders and conversation in general, and not including it puts the person at the receiving end of the communication at a disadvantage. Without the proper context, they may think they have been left out of the loop or have forgotten something important and may never bring it up, instead choosing to muddle through and therefore doing a worse job.

   To avoid all this, communication should give a quick background to the new information, a short description of the client and what they like and how they like it to be done and an explanation for why any deadlines have been set. Once people understand why they are doing something and how it should be done and by when, they are much more likely to deliver on the task itself in the way you want it to be done.

4. Emotional communicationsThere are few places where emotional emails or other communications (WhatsApp or Teams messages and the like) are wanted, and the workplace is not one. Corporate culture places a lot of constraints on human behaviour and as such an emotional communication is definitely going to be not only career limiting, but also cause a lot of discomfort to all who are unlucky enough to be tagged in.

   The problem with emotional communications is that they cause so much discomfort that the issues they are discussing can often become more difficult to deal with. The delays in resolving these issues will lead to poor performance and an uncomfortable work environment.

   These kinds of constraints can also lead to the other kind of bad communication – passive-aggressive emails and communiques. In many cases these cause hurt feelings and divide teams without resolving issues because they claim not to be calling attention to any issue to begin with.

   This issue is fixed by encouraging an open and honest communication policy in your business. Allowing people to speak their minds respectfully and then genuinely listening allows people who have noticed problems to bring them to your attention and for those problems to be resolved. Do not let them linger in the shadow of hurt feelings.

• 6 November – Monthly PAYE submissions and payments
• 16 November – D-date for taxpayers filing online
• 25 November – VAT manual submissions and payments
• 27 November – Excise Duty payments
• 30 November – VAT electronic submissions and payments
• 30 November – Company Provisional Tax Payments where applicable.

There are five common tax pitfalls that owners of small businesses should look out for and avoid.

These hazards include three value added tax (VAT) issues, one provisional tax matter, and the fifth item deals with the tax implications for owners of small businesses when they draw money from their company.

Failing to avoid these pitfalls can cost small businesses dearly in terms of time, stress, and money, including fines. The cost of sorting out these hazards can even destroy small businesses.

1. Failure to register for VAT
   
   The first issue is that many owners of small businesses fail to realise that the VAT Act requires that they register for VAT. This requirement becomes necessary once a business has made taxable supplies exceeding R1 million during twelve consecutive months.

   Once a small business reaches this threshold, then they need to charge their clients VAT for the goods or services sold. “When small businesses manage their tax affairs, they often neglect to do this because they are not aware of this requirement,” Jean du Toit, head of tax technical for Tax Consulting South Africa.

   If it comes to light that a company failed to register for VAT, then SARS could impose penalties, including understatement charges and late payment fines and interest. These penalties will be back dated to when a small company should have been accounting for VAT.

   Small businesses can register for VAT with SARS by applying online, and the process is reasonably straightforward and quick but ask for professional help in any doubt.

   For micro businesses, it may not initially be viable to register for VAT, as they may be mainly dealing with suppliers and clients of a similar size.

   However, the larger a business grows, the more it would lose out on the opportunity to deduct input VAT that they pay over to VAT vendors that supply them with goods and services and so miss out on lower costs. Input VAT is the tax that a VAT vendor can claim back as a deduction from SARS. The output VAT is the tax that a VAT vendor levies on the supply of goods and services and then pays over this tax to SARS.

   The advantage of registering for VAT is that it gives a company greater access to business opportunities, including tenders and contract, which usually require a company to have a VAT number.

   The only way to rectify the lack of the required VAT registration was to apply for SARS’ Voluntary Disclosure Programme (VDP), Du Toit said. Such a VDP application could see SARS waive any penalties, but it would require the company to pay over the VAT due and interest on late payment of this tax. Ask your accountant to help with any VDP application.

   A business can voluntarily register for VAT if over twelve months its income exceeded R50,000. Tertius Troost, a Mazars senior tax consultant, said it might benefit a small business to register voluntarily for VAT if they have many suppliers. But companies must know that there was a cost that went with complying with the VAT Act, he added.

2. Failure to obtain valid tax invoices
   
   The second pitfall relating to VAT was that small business owners often fail to secure valid tax invoices for their VAT input claims, Troost said. Input VAT should have a neutral impact on a company, but if SARS disallows specific claims, then the input VAT becomes a cost, and that will reduce a company’s profitability.

   When a small company claimed input VAT from SARS, it was required to keep records, including specific invoices from their suppliers. “If a company’s administration is not up to scratch, they might not have these documents, or these documents may not meet SARS’ requirements as prescribed in the VAT Act. At that point, SARS won’t allow you to claim back your input VAT,” Du Toit added.

   Ettiene Retief, FTR Tax and Corporate Administration partner, said that SARS usually focussed on the invoices a company received from its suppliers when reviewing VAT input claims.

   The VAT Act specifies that the following details should appear on an invoice for any amount greater than R5000:

   1. The word “tax invoice” or “VAT invoice” or “invoice”,
   2. The name, address, and VAT registration number of the supplier,
   3. The name, address and, where the recipient is a registered vendor, the VAT registration number of the recipient,
   4. The unique number of the invoice, and
   5. An accurate description of the goods or services supplied, and the volume or quantity of goods or services provided.

   For invoices of less than R5000, only the supplier’s information needs to be included on the invoice and not the recipient’s details. Here the supplier need not specify the quantity of goods or services supplied.

3. Trying to claim input VAT for the wrong items
   
   The third issue regarding VAT is that small companies often try to claim input VAT on entertainment, petrol, and rental of motor vehicles. But the VAT Act makes it clear that companies cannot claim these expenses for VAT purposes.

   If a company bought milk, coffee, and sugar to offer to its clients when they visited, the company could not claim VAT on these items because SARS viewed these as entertainment costs, Retief said. “When I’m in my boardroom, I’m selling my time and the coffee is not part of what I’m selling,” he added. “However, if I own a coffee shop, then I can claim VAT on the coffee beans that I buy,” he added.

   If SARS finds that a person or company claimed goods ineligible for VAT purposes, it will reject these claims. In addition, if SARS finds that a person or company has overstated their input VAT, then that means understatement penalties and interest would apply.

4. Misunderstanding about income received in advance
   
   The fourth common issue was that small businesses often forgot that income received in advance was taxable, Du Toit said.

   A common area where companies required deposits was for major construction contracts, he added. An advance payment like this was immediately taxable in the hands of the recipient of that money. Retief said that an exception to this rule was when a company was paid a deposit as security.

   This knowledge is vital for small businesses when they need to make their provisional tax submissions. SARS requires taxpayers to make these submissions twice a year in February and August.

   Small companies had to include income received in advance in their provisional tax disclosure to SARS or face penalties.

5. Implications of drawing money from the business
   
   The fifth prevalent tax issue of which small businesses are often unaware is the tax implications of drawing money from their company through interest-free loans or withdrawals that SARS would deem to be dividends or remuneration. This situation arises with small companies which have a sole director or owner, and he or she makes loans from the company to themselves.

   Another problem is that small companies rarely establish a formal loan agreement between the company and the director.

   If a company director takes a loan from the company without charging interest, then SARS would view that interest as a dividend in specie paid by the company to the director and the company would have to pay dividends tax on that amount.

   Another way that directors of small companies try to avoid paying tax on their remuneration is to have their company issue them with a loan, instead of being paid a salary. “The company should classify the loan as a salary. What often happens is that the director never pays back the loan, or they pay it back slowly over many years to avoid paying income tax,” Du Toit said. “If SARS does a full audit of a company’s books and they see that in substance that loan is not a real loan but a salary, then the agency can reclassify that item, and there will be tax consequences such as penalties and interest,” he added.

   Troost said that usually, the most tax-efficient way for a director or owner of a small company to withdraw money from their company was to receive a salary rather than to withdraw money as a dividend or to receive an interest-free loan.

   Retief said that owners of small businesses often make withdrawals from their business by paying for personal items. But the problem was that the owner and the company are separate legal entities. Directors of small companies often used this means of withdrawing money from the business to avoid paying tax, he added. “With small businesses, the temptation is not to show a big salary because of the tax is payable on that money,” Retief said.

   At the end of the financial year, the company puts payments for personal items through the director’s loan accounts. But it is often difficult to untangle all the transactions and split the personal items from the company transactions, Retief said.

Keep this list of common pitfalls in mind and ask your accountant for advice on your specific circumstances in any doubt.

“Cyber-Security is much more than a matter of IT.” (Stéphane Nappo, 2018 Global Chief Information Security Officer of the year)

According to official communications from Experian, a consumer, business and credit information services agency, an individual in South Africa claiming to represent a legitimate client fraudulently requested services from it and was simply given the  personal information of clients including cell phone numbers; home phone numbers; work phone numbers; employment details; and identity numbers. Information was also leaked for 793,749 business entities and included: names of the companies; contact details; VAT numbers; and banking details. Experian said that the data had then been placed on a third-party data sharing site on the internet, but added that subsequently that third party had “disabled the links” and that the data had “been removed” after Experian was successful in obtaining and executing an Anton Piller order. This does not, however, mean that the danger is over.

Steps to take to protect yourself and your business 

While the breach has been reported to authorities, and South African banks have been working with Experian and the South African Banking Risk Centre (Sabric) to identify which of their customers may have been exposed to the breach and to protect their personal information, the investigation has not yet been concluded. As a result businesses are advised to take numerous steps to prevent any damage that may result from the leak.

The first thing to do is to simply not panic. Despite how bad it sounds the breach does have one very clear silver-lining.

“The compromise of personal information can create opportunities for criminals to impersonate you but does not guarantee access to your banking profile or accounts,” said CEO of the South African Banking Risk Information Centre (SABRIC), Nischal Mewalall.  “However, criminals can use this information to trick you into disclosing your confidential banking details.”

What this means is that you, and the staff who have access to your finances and accounts need to be extremely vigilant when it comes to dealing with phone calls from people claiming to be from banks and financial institutions, or who are eager to get additional details or sell you services that may require you to divulge any further personal information.

The Southern African Fraud Preventions Services (SAFPS) has advised companies and individuals to take the following precautionary measures:

• Do not disclose personal information such as passwords and PINs when asked to do so by anyone via telephone, fax, text messages or even email.
• Change your passwords regularly and never share them with anyone else.
• Verify all requests for personal information and only provide it when there is a legitimate reason to do so.

Experian themselves take this advice further, suggesting that anyone who is afraid they may have been affected to “Visit their online bank and financial accounts, and set up any alert features they may have, if they have not already done so. This could help save some time and keep them notified of any unusual events when they occur”.

The company also recommends that everyone checks their credit report as regularly as possible.

“You can check your credit report for free once every twelve months by visiting AnnualCreditReport.com [locally you could visit a site like https://www.transunion.co.za/].  Checking your credit report can help you identify any unusual activity, such as new accounts, new personal information or inquiries,” says Experian CEO, Brian Cassin.

Additionally, should you suspect that your identity has been compromised, notify your bank and apply immediately for a free Protective Registration listing with SAFPS. This service alerts SAFPS members, including banks and credit providers that your identity has been compromised and additional care must be taken to confirm they are transacting with the legitimate identity holder.

Consumers wanting to apply for a Protective Registration can email SAFPS at protection@safps.org.za.

If you are uncertain as to how to proceed or if you don’t understand any of the processes, get professional help to evaluate and protect your accounts as soon as possible.