Peter Surtees

I do tax opinions for clients. In particular, I offer this service to accounting and law firms on behalf of their clients. Needless to say, in this regard confidentiality is paramount and I respect this.

Because tax in all its aspects is all I do, I remain abreast of all developments in the field: recent amendments to the legislation; decisions of the courts; and SARS publications and rulings. I draw attention to these on my website by means of references and summaries.

My academic qualifications comprise a Bachelor of Commerce from Rhodes University in 1961 and a Master’s in Commerce in Taxation from Rhodes in 1985.

After serving articles and qualifying as a Chartered Accountant (SA) in 1965, I was a partner in Leith Freake & Cade (now part of KPMG) in Bloemfontein until joining the staff of the Department of Accounting at Rhodes University in 1980, where I rose to the position of Professor and Head of Department and Deputy Dean of the Faculty of Commerce. After taking early retirement and moving to Cape Town at the end of 1997 I was appointed to the newly formed tax division of Deneys Reitz (now Norton Rose Fulbright) in its Cape Town office. I retired from this position at the end of 2015 and my spouse, also a registered tax practitioner, and I moved to Napier in the Western Cape, from where I conduct my own practice, largely via the Internet, but I do visit clients.

On my retirement from Rhodes, the university conferred on me the title Professor Emeritus. In 2013 I was appointed Extraordinary Professor in the Department of Taxation at the University of Pretoria. From 1998 until the end of 2016 I held a permanent post at the University of Cape Town, where I presented the MCom (Taxation) course in the Department of Finance and Taxation.

The University of Natal awarded me a Certificate of Commendation for “outstanding contributions to accounting education” at a graduation ceremony held in Cape Town in June 1999. The award recognises my contributions over two decades at Rhodes University, as well as my present teaching at UCT.

I retain one of my more fulfilling positions as a member of the editorial panel of the Monthly Tax Chronicle, the highly regarded joint tax publication of the South African Institute of Taxation and the South African Institute of Professional Accountants. I write widely on tax-related topics nationally and internationally. Since 2007 I have been a member of the Tax Court.