The tourism industry, in its entire value chain, qualifies for the extended Unemployment Insurance Fund (UIF) Temporary Employee Relief Scheme (TERS) programme.

This was confirmed by COO of SATSA, Hannelie du Toit. SATSA has been working to address its members’ TERS headaches and pay-out issues.

The situation with the SIC Codes, as well as a number of proposals to remedy the situation, were discussed at the latest Nedlac UIF Task Team meeting, said Du Toit.
According to her, the challenge is that the UIF must be able to verify that the business does actually operate in the tourism industry.

“The Auditor-General will sample a few companies and complete an audit to ensure that the right people are receiving the funds. It seems that a combination of codes and categories are currently being used, including the SARS SIC codes and CIPC categories.

“Changing all this will be a lengthy process so a quicker option of motivating separately from the current system was proposed. This includes the use of declaration forms and industry association certificates to verify the business as being tourism-focused,” explained Du Toit.

She added that, although it was taking longer than expected to address this, a resolution was imminent. “We anticipate that a decision will soon be made and we will provide further information on how industry can apply and what kind of forms they can use to get the SIC Codes.”