SARS Updates CRS and FATCA Reporting: What Changes for Financial Institutions
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On 23 September 2026, SARS announced changes to how South African financial institutions report financial account information under the Automatic Exchange of Information (AEOI) system. The changes follow the OECD's CRS Schema 3.0 and affect both "nothing to report" submissions and full data submissions. Here is what is changing, who it applies to, and what you should do about it.
What is AEOI?
AEOI is the system that allows tax authorities around the world to share financial account information with each other automatically. It runs under two sets of rules:
FATCA covers accounts held by US tax residents, under South Africa's agreement with the United States.
CRS (Common Reporting Standard) covers accounts held by tax residents of other participating countries.
Under both, certain South African financial institutions must check their accounts to find those held by US or other foreign tax residents, and report the required details to SARS. SARS then shares this information with the relevant foreign tax authorities. It works both ways. As Accounting Weekly has explained before, SARS also receives information on South Africans' offshore accounts through the same network.
Who does this apply to?
Directly applies to Reporting Financial Institutions (RFIs), such as banks, investment entities, custodians and certain insurers, and the Submitting Entities that file on their behalf. More information on the process can be found on the SARS website here.
Newly in scope are financial products and institutions, including e-money products, payment institutions, digital wallet platforms and central bank currency accounts. If you have fintech or payments clients who were never part of AEOI reporting, they may be now.
Indirectly it affects account holders. Because due diligence and self-certification rules are getting stricter, individuals and businesses opening or holding accounts can expect more questions about their tax residency and tax number.
What is changing?
➤ Null submissions (nothing to report)
A null submission is filed by an active RFI that has no reportable accounts for the period. Three things change:
SARS has added a system-generated null submission indicator for its own internal processing.
An FTI02 declaration is no longer required after a successful FTI01 null submission.
One Submitting Entity can now include up to 20 RFIs in a single FTI01 submission.
For groups filing for several entities, this means less admin.
➤ Full data submissions
For institutions that do have reportable accounts, the key changes are:
New financial products and institutions come into scope (e-money, payment institutions, digital wallets and central bank currency accounts).
Stronger due diligence, through stricter self-certification and tax residency identification.
More complete information on account holders and controlling persons.
Better Tax Identification Number (TIN) information.
Stricter data quality standards.
Why is SARS doing this?
SARS says the changes should have little impact on its daily operations. The aim is better quality information, stronger compliance monitoring, easier detection of offshore tax non-compliance and better revenue collection. In simple terms, SARS wants cleaner data it can act on.
When does it apply?
AEOI reporting periods follow the tax year, from 1 March to the end of February, and returns are due at the end of May each year. For the last cycle, SARS opened submissions from 1 April to 31 May 2026. Based on that usual cycle, the next submissions covering March 2026 to February 2027 are expected by the end of May 2027. Watch for SARS's formal announcement of the submission window.
Updated documents
SARS has updated two documents:
The BRS is the technical file format specification. Your client's IT or reporting team will need it.
What you should do now
Check if your clients are in scope. Look closely at any client offering e-money, digital wallets or payment services. They may now be RFIs.
Review onboarding forms. Self-certification and TIN collection must be complete and accurate. Gaps found now are easier to fix than gaps found by SARS.
Simplify null filings. If you file for a group, you can now combine up to 20 RFIs in one FTI01 and drop the FTI02 step.
Share the BRS with system teams early. File format changes take time to build and test.
Remember the bigger picture. SARS's CRS rules were already updated alongside new crypto reporting rules. Reporting on digital financial products is clearly a SARS priority.
👉 Join CIBA and we'll show you how to turn complex SARS reporting rules into a service your clients will pay for.
