Couples tax optimiser

Who should earn, save in an RA and pay the medical aid - the same household money split two ways, today and at retirement.

Changes you make are confirmed here.

Example data - to be completed. These numbers belong to a sample household. Put in your own figures →

Costs R 1 800 a year more today

Worked out below for today and at retirement.

Tax today - current split
R 124 733
Both of you, a year, after rebates and medical credits.
Tax today - proposed split
R 126 533
Same household money, split the proposed way.
Tax saved a year - today
-R 1 800
Current less proposed. Negative = the proposed split costs more.
Tax saved a year - at retirement
-
Each pot grown to its owner's retirement age, drawn down and taxed with the 65+ rebates.

What this means

  • Each of you is taxed separately - SA has no joint return - so the same household money can attract less tax when it is spread across both of your brackets.
  • An RA saves tax only up to 27.5% of income, capped at R 350 000 a year each - anything above that is carried forward, not lost.
  • At retirement the first R550 000 of each person's lump sum is tax-free, and each of you has your own rebates - two balanced pots usually pay less tax than one big one.
  • Moving salary between spouses in a family company must reflect real work done, or SARS can challenge it.

How this is worked out →

Your split

Moving salary between spouses in a family company must reflect real work done, or SARS can challenge it. An estimate, not tax advice.

How it is worked out

  • SARS 2025/26 tables: each person's salary less their RA deduction and other deductible expenses, through the brackets, less the rebates for their age (R 17 235 primary; R 9 444 more from 65; R 3 145 more from 75).
  • RA: deductible up to 27.5% of income, capped at R 350 000 a year per person. The excess is carried forward - at retirement it is set off against the lump sum first.
  • Medical scheme fees credit to whoever pays the medical aid: R 364 a month main member, R 364 first dependant, R 246 each further one (split by share of the fees if you both pay).
  • Additional medical credit, under 65: 25% of (fees above 4 times the credit, plus costs not covered) above 7.5% of that person's taxable income. From 65: 33.3% of (fees above 3 times the credit, plus all costs).
  • At retirement: each pot grows to its owner's retirement age at the growth less inflation, with the RA contributions added, so every figure is in today's money. Optionally one-third is taken as cash (retirement lump-sum table: first R550 000 tax-free, then 18%, 27%, 36%; earlier lump sums ignored). The rest is drawn at the drawdown rate and taxed with the 65+ (and from 75 the 75+) rebates; medical aid and costs carry in with whoever pays them.
  • Take-home is salary less PAYE, UIF, RA, medical aid, medical costs and other deductible expenses - what is left to spend.

What happens to your statement

A statement we can read is never written to disk and is never kept. Your PDF or CSV is read in memory, the transactions are taken out of it, and the file itself is gone before the page comes back. We never have a copy of a statement we could read.

The one exception is a statement laid out in a way we cannot read yet. Then we keep one encrypted copy of that file, not linked to your account here, so we can teach the site to read that layout, and we delete it after 30 days. Nothing from it is added to your transactions.

The transactions we read out of it are kept for 13 months, so that your statements are still here when you come back next month and so this September can be put beside last September. What is kept for each transaction is exactly this: the date, the description as your bank printed it, the shop name we worked out from it, the amount, the running balance if your bank printed one, and the category it ended up in. Alongside them we keep which bank it was, which account type your bank printed on it, and which dates it covered.

We keep your account number, and we hold it encrypted. It is on the screen because it is the only thing that tells two accounts at the same bank apart — two Investec accounts can both be called "Private Bank Account". It is stored scrambled with a key that is not kept in the same place as the number, and it is deleted when the rest of your statements are: with your account if you have one, or with the 13 months if you do not.

We put a cookie in this browser so that your statements are still here when you come back. It holds one random number and nothing else. That cookie is the only thing that joins one visit to the next, it is the only way we can find your statements again, and clearing your browser's cookies ends it — after that we have no way to match you to anything we hold, and it is deleted when it expires.

We do not ask who you are. We do not store your name, and we do not store your IP address, and you can use all of this without telling us anything about yourself. The account number above is the one thing we read off the statement that identifies the account, and we never ask you to type it in.

If you create an account, we store your email address and a scrambled form of your password — nothing else about you. That is the only thing an account changes: your statements follow your email address instead of this browser, so you can reach them from your phone or from another computer. We never keep the password itself and it cannot be worked back out of what we store.

After 13 months it is deleted automatically, by a job that runs every night, and the 13 months starts again each time you come back. An account is the exception: your statements are kept for as long as the account exists — a tool for putting this September beside last September cannot delete the September you came back to compare against.

We also keep a count of how often a shop lands in a category — like “CHECKERS, Groceries, 412 times” — and your corrections improve it. That count is all we keep: no amounts, no dates, and no link to you or to anyone else.

Nothing about your statement leaves our servers. It is not sent to any other company, it is not used to advertise to you, and it is not sold.

When you tell us to always file a shop or a description under a category, that rule is kept with your statements — the text it matches, the category you chose and, if you limited it to one account, which account; nothing else. The Rules page lists every rule and deletes any of it.

The full privacy policy and the terms of use say the same things at greater length.

You need to accept this before you upload a statement. It stays in the left-hand menu, so you can read it again at any time.