Skills audit addresses Sars capacity issues

SA Revenue Service Customs
is undertaking a skills audit at
every port of entry in order to
upskill the level of knowledge
and capabilities of the
organisation and to address
issues around capacity.
“It’s clear that we have made
a lot of progress around the
modernisation of our systems
– reducing the number of
paper-based transactions and
reducing the time it takes to
import and export, but an
unintended consequence is
that less focus has been given
to the people side,” said chief
officer Customs & Excise, Jed
Michaletos.
“Our number one priority
is to address this shortfall. At
the moment we have roughly
2 500 officials – and we’re
doing a lot of work to ascertain
what that number should be.
“We’re looking at every port
of entry, based on the volume
of trade and on the different
volumetrics, to get an idea of
how many staff we need to
manage the complexities of
each specific port,” he added.